Runny Eggs 4
by quisty8616
Summary: A parody of Resident Evil 4 in which there are absolutely no zombies. Only halfcrazed deranged lunatic Spanishtype people, people with questionable virtues, and one slightly dense blond American who is only here for the food.
1. Prologue

_So this is something I started in Accounting class the other day. Please read and review! _

_Also please note: I do not own the Resident Evil franchise, nor do I own James Bond. Thanks much!_

RUNNY EGGS

OMNIPOTENT VOICE OF DOOM (OVoD): Raccoon City, 19…19…uh, whenever that whole virus-outbreak-nuke-the-city thing happened. Quite honestly, I was kind of smashed throughout that whole 1990's thing. That was when my wife left me and then the house burned down and then my car mysteriously rolled off a fifty-foot suspension bridge with my dog inside…really it was a bad time… What? Oh, sorry. (Ahem!) Virus outbreak by the Umbrella Company coughevilcompanywhoexperimentsonhumansandhasabsolutely-nomoralscoughcough! forces the president to nuke the city six ways 'till Tuesday.

Strangely enough, the rest of the world is not disturbed by this flagrant violation of all the above-ground nuclear testing bans set up in the 1960's and the Zombie Legions from the Depths of Hades are eliminated. Stuff happens, Umbrella explodes in a fiery inferno known as a stock collapse and the Furby fades from memory, hopefully in some sort of blazing disaster, because come on. Who doesn't love explosions? Am I right or am I right? What? Stick to the script? But…Fine. Oblah-dee, oblah-dah, life goes on.

Suddenly, one fateful day in April…or was it May? October? January? Whenever. The president's daughter is kidnapped from…that's her? Damn, she's hot! Do you guys have her phone number…Don't wave that script at me! If you're going to wave anything, make it a bottle of rum, for God's sake. Captain Morgan, if you got it. Okay, okay. So this chick is kidnapped. How they got by her obligatory Secret Service guards, I have no idea. Then the president get this ransom note, see? Here's what it said:

_Dear United States of America,_

_Hello! How are you all on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean? We are all fine; it's been unseasonably cold lately, but what are you going to do, right? How are you getting along with all your American-type activities?_

_Anyway, the reason we are writing is to let you know that we've got your daughter, Ashley, here with us. She's fine and is really enjoying herself. Yester-day, she went swimming and made a dream catcher in Arts and Crafts Hour. She sends her love and would like you to send some clean socks, as hers were eaten by a rabid wolf._

_Love and Kisses,_

_Osmund Saddler_

_Spain division of the Los Illuminados Evil Cult_

OVoD: Although no one really liked Ashley, for reasons unknown, the president called out the Marines to get her back. Unfortunately, the Marines must have been screening their calls, because they never picked up the phone. As a last resort, the president called upon the elite forces of the pizza delivery guy who happened to be strolling past the White House that day. This man's name was Leon Scott Kennedy. Here's how his recruitment speech went:

President:So, Leon. Do you mind if I call you Leon? Let me ask you, Leon, do you like secret agents?

Leon:Uh, yeah. Roger Moore is awesome. Live and Let Die is my favorite Bond movie.

President:Roger Moore! What the hell is wrong with you, boy? Sean Connery is the best Bond and you f-in' know it!

Secret Service Guy: Uh, guys? What about Timothy Dalton?

Leon and President: Uh, no. Shut up.

SSG: Well, I still…

President:No one cares! Anyway. Leon, how would you like to be a secret agent?

Leon:Well…I dunno… What's the pay?

President:Actually, we're a bit tight on funds right now, so it'd be a volunteer thing.

Leon:Do I get kick-ass gadgets and weapons and cars and shit?

President:You get a crappy handgun, one clip of bullets, and some first aid spray. And you'll be dropped off by two Spanish police officers in a Range Rover.

Leon:Any hot babe sidekicks that will sleep with me upon request?

President:One girl, my daughter. Touch her and I'll rip your lungs out and shove them up your nose.

Leon:…is she hot?

President:Here's a picture.

Leon:Meh. She's all right. Too preppy cheerleader for my taste. How is she from the back?

President:(coldly) I'm her father.

Leon:Yeah, but you're a guy too, right?

SSG:It's not bad, sir.

President:You shut the hell up!

Leon:One last question: are there zombies?

President:Of course not! This is scenic Spain! You'll probably be able to hit the bars and enjoy the local night life afterwards!

Leon:But not with your daughter.

President:No.

Leon:Well…as long as there are no zombies…

OVoD: So Leon was dispatched from the United States for Scenic Spain with only a handgun with the equivalent firepower of a Super Soaker, a clip of bullets, and the help of one Ingrid Hunnigan, a woman whose only real purpose is to state the obvious. Leon set out into the unknown, to face the not-quite-zombie members of the Los Illuminados… 


	2. Ch 1: So this is scenic Spain

_So this is scenic Spain_, Leon thought ruefully as he gazed out the window of what had turned out not to be a Range Rover at all, but a cheap European knockoff with seats as comfortable as a slab of concrete and a suspicious smell that reminded Leon of tuna fish and wet dog. He didn't want to know any more. _Looks more like…unscenic Spain…_ He silently congratulated himself for his amazingly witty joke and continued pouting about the passing scenery.

Apparently, someone had left Spain out in the sun for too long. The passing forest outside was completely devoid of any color other than shades of gray and brown. Not surprisingly, it was kind of a dreary place. To make things even better, it looked like rain. Just because it could. The only color lay in bright neon signs posted randomly along the road Leon and these two Standard Issue Spanish Cops had been bumping down for the last hour and a half. These signs said everything from "_Welcome to Los Illuminados: Spain Division – Home of the Deranged Villagers_" to "_Turn back now; there's only more of the same ahead_" and "_Buckle Up; It's the Law!"_

"At least there are no zombies," Leon thought to himself.

At that point, Standard Issue Spanish Cop #1 chose to veer sharply off course and take the pseudo-Range Rover over a barbed wire fence that happened to be randomly stretched across the road. Leon looked back at the fence and saw a huge five-foot sign in neon lights that read: "Do not come here! We have not kidnapped any American president's daughters and we are definitely not injecting her with some creepy parasite! Why would you ever think that! Please check in with guard at the visitor's center and get a parking permit!" A chill ran down Leon's spine with the eerie preciseness of the sign.

"Hey you Spanish-type fellows," he said, "I think we should've turned off back there. The sign said something about a parking permit…"

"What's the matter, cowboy?" Standard Issue Spanish Cop #2 leered into the backseat, "You scared?"

"Wh…what? Hell no!" Leon snapped, puffing himself up to his maximum manliness factor. "Oh, hell no," he repeated, his voice several notes deeper, "Because I…am a man!"

The cops stared blankly at him and then erupted into laughter. SI Spanish Cop #1, who was driving, nearly drove the car off a cliff, he was laughing so hard. Leon scowled at them and fingered the trigger of his wussy gun.

"Okay, Barbie," SI Cop #1 finally managed to say, "Whatever you say. Parking permits are for touristy Americans with snappy bomber jackets."

"So they sent you out here all alone, eh?" SI Cop #2 said, "You gonna take on the zombies all by yourself, eh, Superman?"

"You know, I have a name," Leon bristled, and what are…" He froze. "Zombies?"

"You think you can handle yourself out here, Roy Rogers?" SI Cop #2 continued.

"No, you said something about zombies. What about zombies?"

"Because it can get pretty _loco como infierno_ out here, John Wayne," SI Cop #1 added, "You never know…"

"Why did you say zombies?" Why are there zombies? They told me there wouldn't be any zombies! You guys have to help me with the zombies!"

"Here we are," SI Cop #1 ignored Leon's hysterical screaming and grinned maliciously at the blonde American in the snappy bomber jacket, "Good luck, Mickey Mouse."

"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!" Leon cried, digging his fingers into the car seat, "Don't make me! Mommy!" SI Cop #2 sighed and, whipping out his Standard Issue Spanish Crowbar from the glove compartment, he pried the howling Leon from the car.

"Get moving, Buck Rogers," SI Cop #1 growled from the car window, "The zombies are waiting…"

Whimpering, Leon walked toward a nearby farmhouse, wishing dearly that Mr. Binky, his stuffed teddy bear, was here with him, "You can do this," Leon told himself, "Nothing to be afraid of. Oh, Mr. Binky! Where are you when I need you?"

Leon pushed open the front door to the house and stepped in. The house was just as lovely on the inside as its exterior, which is to say it was not exactly the Ritz Carlton. That same smell from the car was here too, except added to the dreariness were about twenty million pounds of dirt and spiderwebs. Leon pushed on through the wall o' stench and found himself in the company of a man who, by some miracle, was not a zombie. Leon breathed a sigh of relief and stepped toward the man.

"Uh, bonjour, sir," Leon said, completely forgetting what country he was in, "Hey, I'm looking for this girl, umm…_cette fille_, in this…shit." He patted his pockets, frantically searching for the picture the president had given him. Little did he know that the president had never given him a picture. Moo ha ha! "Dammit," Leon cursed his luck, "Well anyway, I'm looking for this chick, blonde hair, okay face, preppy look, supposedly nice ass…"

"Why, of course I've seen her!" the man said genially, "Please partake in a cup of tea before I take you to the dear girl. Would you excuse me for a moment? I fear I must go chop some more wood for the fire."

Unfortunately for this man, Leon had taken French in high school. As the man reached for his axe, Leon shrieked, "OMFG ZOMBIE!" and in a flash, he emptied an entire clip of bullets into the poor gentleman.

At that moment, several things happened. First, the ominous music kicked in. Leon, however, was not perturbed the music, as this happened all the time to him. He had his own theme music, after all. Second, a truck bearing the words _Los Illuminados Parking Service_ came barreling down the road in front of the house, smashed into the cop Range Rover and kept going into a nearby ravine. Thirdly, Leon stole the dead guy's wallet.

"Dude! 260 pesetas!" Leon said, astounded, "This guy was completely loaded!" He slipped the cash and the man's credit cards into his own wallet and headed for the door. The door wouldn't open. After about half an hour of pushing on the door, Leon finally noticed a small sign on the door that read "Pull" in English. Leon, however, couldn't read. He shrugged and catapulted himself out the nearest second story window. Just because, you know, he could.

"Ahi esta!" a voice from the front of the house called. Immediately, Leon's gun was pointed in the opposite direction of the voice. Leon had some pretty severe issues, in case you haven't noticed.

Three men came along the side of the house. "There you are!" one said in Spanish, "Welcome to our humble village, O exalted visitor!"

"Please come with us to the village!" the man with the dull pitchfork said, "We have gourmet American-type food, hot German sports cars and hot tubs filled with beautiful women!"

"ZOMBIES!" Leon cried, whipping his gun around to face the men. Five minutes later, Leon was prancing in a relatively manly way down the scary gray-and-brown woodland path, his pockets jingling with 526 pesetas and three more driver's licenses. He twirled the gun around his finger and jauntily whistled the theme song from Goldfinger.

Suddenly, his walkie-talkie crackled. Leon held it up and, thanks to the new technology, he was treated to a live video feed of a member of the female gender. "Well, hey, baby," Leon greeted this new woman with a cheesy grin, "I don't know how you got my number, but I'm sure glad you did."

The woman raised one eyebrow dubiously. Then she spoke. "First of all, this is a walkie-talkie. You don't need a phone number for a walkie-talkie. Second, my name is Ingrid Hunnigan, not any of the following: baby, sweetie, sweet cheeks, honey, angel, hot stuff, or any variation thereof. I am your support on this mission and…"

"Hey, buttercup, all I need is your face and that's enough support for me. Wanna go get some drinks after this?"

"…And! I already hate you. This mission is going to suck. Basically, my job is to give you useless information and to state the obvious. I'm calling now to tel you that you should walk down this path and look for Ashley."

"Who?"

Hunnigan sighed, "I'm going to pretend you didn't say that. Hunnigan out."

The walkie-talkie crackled silent and Leon grinned, "She digs me. It's gotta be the gun. Chicks dig guns."

"Ahi esta!"

Leon tensed like a cat, his entire body ready for some ass-kicking. Two men were on the path up ahead. They were running toward him and were carrying sharp farming implements. "Hey, stranger!" one shouted, "I would like to offer you some peccadillo!"

Blam! Blam!

Leon continued down the path, still musing about Hunnigan and that other chick he was supposed to save. Jennifer? Tina? Ah, whatever. He ducked into a shed to look for some more cash and stopped dead in his tracks. There, on the wall was a woman with a pitchfork through her face.

"Well hello," Leon purred, sidling up to the woman, "Where have you been all my life, sweet cheeks?"

The woman didn't answer, for obvious reasons.

"Oh, shy," Leon chuckled, "My name's Leon. I'm a secret agent. Whatcha think about that? Wanna see my gun?"

Silence.

"Okay, I'm going to be straight with you," Leon said, "D'you wanna date?"

The woman was silent. Leon shrugged and continued down the path until he came to a village. Still on the alert for killer zombies, Leon ducked behind a tree and stealthily spied on the village using his high-tech binoculars.

"Okay, here we go," Leon said out loud," We got chicken, chicken, cow, chicken. Zombie man pushing a wheelbarrow, girl…ooh! Hmm...nah, not my type. Ooh! Or there's that other girl… Chicken, zombie man, HOLY SHIT!"

The sight that evoked such a profanity from Leon was Standard Issue Spanish Cop #1 dangling over a fire with a hook through his chest. Leon hoped he was okay, or at least had the car keys.

Because Leon had been speaking out loud, his cry of HOLY SHIT! had alerted the villagers in Pueblo Town to his whereabouts. Immediately, they all dropped whatever they were doing and began to rush over to greet their new visitor. "Yay, a stranger!" they cried, "Let's show him a good time! Come on, Mr. American-type Man! Come on in and play some pinball in our new arcade!"

"HOLY…ZOMBIES AWAY!" Leon jumped up and chucked his binoculars into the woods behind him. They would do him no good here. Using his awe-inspiring secret agent moves, Leon ran screaming into the village and ran into the nearest house he could find.

"But Mr. American-type Man!" the villagers cried after him, "We just want to be your friend!"

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!" Leon shouted. He dashed up the stairs and thankfully found a shotgun on the wall. Underneath the shotgun was a plaque with the words, "Grandpa's Crappy Shotgun. May he rest in peace." Unfortunately, Leon couldn't read.

Also on the second floor was a window. Leon's eyes gleamed. He couldn't go out the door anymore; it was already closed. Maybe…just maybe…it was a wild idea, but it just might work! Leon took a running start and flung himself out the window.

The villagers watched in awe as the American-type man flew out the window and landed on the dirt just beyond their welcoming committee. "I bet you could use a drink after a stunt like that," one of them said as he held out a martini to Leon, "It's shaken, not stirred, just the way you Americans like it."

"DIE ZOMBIES!" Leon cocked the shotgun and began blasting holes in the villagers. Olives flew everywhere as the peaceful-minded villagers fell to their gruesome deaths at the hands of the crazed blonde man in a snappy bomber jacket.

All of a sudden, there was the sound of a bell ringing. Every single villager froze and turned toward the sound. "It's the bell," one man said.

"It's time for our mid-morning massages," another man said, "We have to go."

As Leon watched in awe, every single villager in Pueblo Town dropped their farming utensils and plodded toward a building with a large sign over the door. The sign read: "Secret Passage. There is no Bingo in this direction" in plain English.

"Where's everyone going?" Leon asked, "Bingo?"

OVoD: I would like if I may, to take you on a strange journey. A journey called…Resident Evil…FOUR! (cue logo)

Leon heard the voice of the Omnipotent Voice of Doom coming from somewhere overhead, but he just ignored it. After all, this sort of thing happened to him all the time.

* * *

_A/N: Chapter One up and running! This is going to be quite a long story; I'm not going to be breaking it up at chapter endings, because quite frankly, I don't remember when they were. I'm doing most of this by memory, so if I forget something, just let me know. Merci beaucoup!  
_


	3. Ch 2: Dream World of Magic

Psh crackle cracle

"Leon, come in."

"Oh, I'm in, babe. Whatcha want?"

"…to punch you in the face, but that's beside the point. What's happened now?"

"Well, I killed some zombies, met a nice girl, killed more zombies, and was just about to torture some farm animals. Hehehe… Why?"

"Have you found out where Ashley is?"

"Ashley…Ashley…oh, that one chick? Don't worry about it. It's all under control."

"You have her?"

"No."

"Where is she?"

"How the hell should I know?"

"Because it's your goddamn job, you horrible, horrible man!"

"Geez, Hunnigan! Calm down! There's no need to get huffy about this."

"That girl could be dead!"

"Nah, I don't think so."

"Look, will you just go find her? Try looking for a tower."

"Why?"

"Because I know everything. Just do it."

"If I do it, will you go to dinner with me after this?"

"Do you think about anything other than women?"

"Yeah. Guns."

"…just find the damn tower."

The walkie-talkie crackled silent and Leon tucked it in some random pocket on his person. Somehow, he was able to carry a whole bunch of crap in some secret briefcase that must be small enough to fit in his pocket. But then, there are a lot of things that Leon does that defy logic, so…

Anyway, Leon looked around Pueblo Town for a tower. Indeed, there was one in the northern area of the village. On his way back to the tower, he paused at the body of Standard Issue Spanish Cop #1 and checked his pockets. Empty. "Damn," Leon cursed. On his way out of the village, he managed to find an unbroken martini glass, several caches of about 100 pesetas each (at which Leon did a happy dance) and several thousand green herbs, which he ignored. Because as far as Leon cared, he did not need to carry around some dippy house plant; he was here for a mission and that mission was to…to…

As Leon tried valiantly to remember what his mission was, he walked randomly into a nearby farm, which was inhabited by several kindly Spanish village folk, a mess o' cattle, some chickens, and a typewriter.

"Why is there a typewriter in the middle of the Spanish countryside?" Leon pondered to himself, thankful to have an excuse to not try to remember his mission, for a few minutes at least. Leon banged on the typewriter keys for a while, then got bored and began to shoot blue things down from trees and barns and stuff in the farm.

All his random shooting managed to call the well-meaning Spanish people from their pastoral country-folk jobs, such as pitchforking hay and doing whatever else it is that they're doing. Honestly, why are they even farming? The land doesn't really look very hospitable to any kind of crop whatsoever, other than Scary Bland-Colored Spanish Horror Movie grass.

So anyway, the villagers appeared from nowhere to greet Leon. Leon, however, was so absorbed with shooting down the blue things, that he didn't even notice the non-descript clones of the villagers from Pueblo Town as they made their way toward him, climbing menacingly over fences and dragging their farm implements behind them. Somehow, these farm people got in the way of Leon's bullets and though Leon managed to shoot down however many blue things were in the farm, he also managed to kill all the poor helpless village people and the cows as well.

"Ooh!" Shiny Spanish dollars! I wonder where these came from!" Leon grinned as he picked the dead villagers' pockets, not even registering the fact that the money he was picking up was still inside the pockets of these peoples' pants.

So…Leon made his way through the farm, stealing these people blind. God knows why they kept handgun bullets in huge barrels, but it's impossible to hide anything from Leon when he's on the rampage! After effectively looting the now-dead villagers of their stuff, he continued on and found himself in a narrow canyon-like area.

This canyon area was quite a scenic place…if you are a ZOMBIE! No, haha! Just kidding. To be sure, the canyon was narrow, just wide enough for a large boulder to roll comfortably through and crush any people who happened to be trying to utilize said canyon. Leon noted this as he walked blissfully past a sign that had a human skull hanging off it and the words "Watch out for booby trap: falling boulder ahead. Press X (or A for you Game Cube users) really fast."

Leon mused out loud as he walked, "I wonder if there's a booby trap up here. I suppose it's about time for one. Let's see, if I were to booby trap this path, I would use a…GIANT BOULDER THAT CONVENIENTLY JUST FITS INSIDE THE PATH!"

Indeed, at that precise moment, a pair of nondescript villagers pushed down their version of the welcome mat into the canyon, a giant boulder that conveniently just fit inside the path. As Leon ran like crazy, pressing the X (or A) button as fast as he could, the villagers high-fived each other and congratulated themselves on welcoming their new American guest.

As Leon ran from the boulder, a thought suddenly popped into his head. "Hey!" he shouted to the ever-nearing boulder, "I remember what my mission is!"

"Really?" said the boulder in a highly interested tone. It stopped short, balanced perfectly on the steeply sloped hill and said in a refined British accent, "Do tell, old chap!"

"Well…" Leon said, slightly disturbed by the fact that a giant rock was talking to him, "I'm supposed to save this chick. What was her name again?"

"Ashley?" prompted the rock.

"Hey, yeah! That's it!" Leon grinned at the rock, "Have you seen her?"

"Hmm…" mused the rock, "Blonde hair, preppy clothes, whiny irritating voice?"

"Yeah, that's her."

"Nope," said the rock, "Haven't seen her. But I think you'd better run. I can't keep my balance much longer."

"Gee, thanks," said Leon as he turned and ran toward a dark and cobwebby tunnel just ahead.

"No problem, mate," the rock said. It crashed into the tunnel opening and, being the right size for the canyon path, but not small enough to fit through the archway, broke into little pieces.

Leon bowed his head in memory of the boulder, and continued on his way, shooting randomly at the ceiling of the tunnel and managing to dislodge several precious jewels that had somehow managed to defy the laws of gravity and stick themselves to the ceiling. Whatever.

On the other side of the tunnel was a collection of ramshackle buildings, all of which had boarded-up windows and/or bear traps in the doorways. Also in these houses were more villagers, this time carrying firecrackers in celebration of their new guest.

As Leon neared the larger of the two houses, he was bombarded by a fanfare of explosions which managed to set his shoes on fire. In trying to put out the fire on his shoes, Leon was able to step in every single bear trap he came across. One wonders if this was intentional and, if so, if Leon is a masochist.

So anyway, Leon wandered throughout the little cluster of houses. The silence around the houses was broken continuously by these sounds: Blam! (dynamite) "Mr. American, we love you!" (in Spanish) "AAAAAAAAAA! ZOMBIES!" Several gunshots (most of them missing their target) "Greetings, comrade!" "AAAAAAAAA!" Blam. "AAAAAAAAAA!" "Would you like a tequila?" "AAAAAAAA!" More gunshots.

Finally, Leon was alone, excepting the awesome presence of his wussy little gun. Leon patted the gun and twirled it around his finger, 'spaghetti-western' style. It fell off his finger and went off, missing his face by millimeters. Sheepishly, Leon picked it up and jammed it in his pocket. "I meant to do that," he announced to the Thrilling Gray Scenery ™.

"Yeah," said the scenery, "Sure you did. And I'm a brilliant shade of fluorescent orange. Loser."

In retaliation for the scenery's disparaging remarks, Leon stomped a bush into the ground and continued on into another house. This house was virtually wallpapered with C4 traps and string. So Leon did what any secret agent would do. He constructed an elaborate bomb-tripping device made of a shoelace, some leaves, and a popsicle stick he randomly found in his pocket. Oh, wait. That's a Macgyver thing… Well, Leon tried that and it didn't work. So then he just shot the wires. Really, at this point, it's a wonder Leon had any bullets left. He twirled the gun again, promptly dropped it, and this time, the bullet miraculously ricocheted off the walls and into a back room, where it embedded itself in a giant wiggling armoire.

"Hey," Leon said as he followed the bullet's path, "A giant wiggling armoire in the middle of a slightly eccentric Spanish country village. I wonder what I should do with it…" Leon thought carefully back to his training...

"_Okay, so when you're delivering the pizzas, you want to make sure you get there in under 30 minutes, understand?" Gino told the five new employees as he pointed to a large pizza box sitting on a desk, "Otherwise, we take the price of the pizza out of your paycheck."_

_Leon raised his hand, "But what if you get hungry on the way to the house? Are we allowed to eat the pizza?"_

_Gino stared blankly at the blonde American with the snappy bomber jacket underneath his brightly colored Pizza Palace polo shirt. "No," he said, "No. You may not eat the pizza."_

"_What if it's just one piece?"_

"_Are you serious?" _

"_What if it's half a piece?"_

"_Son, do you even want to work here?"_

"_I have another question," Leon said, raising his hand again, even though every single person in the room was staring awkwardly at him, "What happens if I end up in the Spanish countryside and I go into a room and there's a wiggling armoire in the room?"_

"…_Right…" Gino said uncomfortably. "So, now that all questions have been answered, you boys get out there and start delivering them pizzas."_

"Hmm," Leon thought to himself, "That didn't help much…" He stared at the wiggling armoire for another five minutes, debating whether to open the armoire and see what was inside or to just shoot it. Something inside him told him to just shoot the damn thing, but against his better (questionable) judgment, Leon decided to open the armoire. "After all," he said to himself, "It could lead to a secret land of fantasy and talking animals. Like Narnia!"

Leon walked up to the wardrobe and turned the handle. The door swung open and out fell a dapper Spanish man who was kind of dressed like a cowboy. The Spanish guy was tied hand and foot and had tape over his mouth.

"ZOMBIE!" Leon shouted and pointed his gun at the Spanish guy, who began to make indiscernible protesting noises and shook his head violently.

"Not zombie?" Leon said, a little disappointed. The man nodded vigorously. Now really disappointed, Leon sighed heavily and ripped the tape off the Spanish man's mouth.

"A little rough, don't you think?" the Spanish man said.

"Meh," Leon replied, "I don't think so. Hey, why were you hiding in that armoire?"

"I wasn't hiding," the Spanish guy said, "They tied me up and put me in there."

"So were you looking for Narnia?"

"I wasn't looking for anything. I'm tied up. Why would I tie myself up and hide in an armoire in a village of murderous half-crazed villagers?"

"I dunno. It could be fun."

"…Oookay…" The Spanish guy eyed Leon nervously, then said, "I have just one very, very, very important question."

"Shoot."

"What is the airspeed velocity of an unladen swallow?"

"…" Leon pondered this, then answered, "…I don't smoke. But, I got gum."

Just then, a big Spanish man walked into the room. And I mean big. This guy was, like, twenty feet tall and must have weighed the same as a small European car. Which is convenient should anyone care to test this estimation, because guess what! They're in Europe!

No, actually, the guy was more like 6 and a half, 7 feet tall. But that's still pretty damn big. He also looked like he was wearing shoulder pads underneath his camouflage trench coat (so called because it was gasp! gray. He blended in perfectly! That is, if he wasn't the size of a small European car). He eyed the pair of men with his one good eye, the other being an obvious glass eye (KEY POINT!).

"Perfect," the dapper, formerly bound and gagged Spanish guy said, "The big cheese."

"Maybe you could ask him your question," Leon prompted helpfully. The Spanish guy just gave him a silencing look.

"Are you the one who's been killing all my villagers?" the big shoulder-padded Spanish guy said, pointing a huge finger at Leon.

"What, you mean the zombies?" Leon said proudly, "Yeah, that was me. No need to thank me…oof!"

Halfway through Leon's statement, the big Spanish guy moved forward with lightning speed and performed the Vulcan Death Grip on Leon. But only enough to knock him out. As his vision darkened and he fell to the ground, the last thought that went through Leon's mind was, "Oh, I hope they don't steal my snappy bomber jacket…"

* * *

_A/N: Yeah. I have the Playstation version of the game, hence the X button being listed first. If anyone cares. Next: the Chief's House and the Mysterious Woman in the Red Dress. Isn't there one of those in every story ever told?_

* * *


	4. Ch 3: In the House of the Big Cheese

**Chapter 3: In the House of the Big Cheese**

"Feeble humans," said a creepy faceless voice, "Soon you'll experience our awesome power. You'll be unable to resist…"

Unconscious Leon blinked weakly. "Um, no thanks," he tried to say, "Thanks _muchos grande_, as you folks say, but I really don't want any powers." All that came out, however was "Urrrgh flurgle urrrrgh powers."

"What'd he say?" another faceless voice said.

"I think he said, 'Steal my jacket and inject me with an evil mind-controlling parasite, if you please.'"

"Are you sure?"

"No."

"Good enough for me." A disembodied hand appeared with a needle the size of Arkansas. "This may hurt a little," the disembodied hand chuckled as it stabbed the needle into Leon's neck. Leon convulsed for a minute, passed out, and when he woke up, he was tied to the aforementioned dapper Spanish guy.

"Hey," Leon elbowed the sleeping man, "Hey, wake up!" When his gentle nudging didn't help, Leon jabbed the Spanish guy in the back with his elbow.

"Holy frijoles!" the Spanish guy shouted, "I think you cracked my spine, amigo!" He looked around the sadly decrepit room, "Ai yi yi. Out of one hole and into another."

"Got a question for you," Leon whispered all stealthy-like, "I'm looking for this girl, see? Blonde hair, preppy clothes, supposedly…"

"Oh, you mean her?" the Spanish guy whipped out a picture, the very picture Leon had gotten from the president in the Prologue and lost way back in Chapter 1.

"Hey! Where'd you get that?"

The Spanish guy shrugged, "I found it."

Leon just gaped, "Found it? But what…" He shook his head, "Never mind. Have you seen the girl?"

"No. Who is she?"

"Psh! I'm not telling you, bucko! That's top-secret!"

"Is she the president's daughter?"

"No! Well, yes. How did you know?"

The Spanish guy shrugged again, which was not an easy feat to do while tied to another guy. "Psychic powers," he said nonchalantly

"Yeah, right," Leon scoffed, "If you're psychic, tell me something about me."

The Spanish guy sighed, as if he got this kind of thing all the time, "Your name is Leon Scott Kennedy, you're a pizza delivery man-turned-secret agent, you're paranoid about zombies, you left your teddy bear at home, during junior year in high school, Suzy MacPhearson kicked your butt up and down the…"

"Okay, okay. I get it. You're psychic. Who are you anyway?"

"Nah, I'm just messing with you. I'm not psychic," the Spanish guy laughed, "I've been stalking you for the past six months."

"From an armoire."

"Well, I wasn't in that thing the whole time."

"Tied up."

"…Nah, I'm just messing with you! I'm psychic."

"Are you going to answer my questions?

"You never answered mine."

"What, about the swallow? That was a stupid question!"

"Oh, and yours aren't? 'Who are you?' How is that relevant?"

"So I don't have to keep calling you 'the Spanish guy'."

The Spanish guy pondered this. "Fair enough. Me llamo Luis Sera. And the chick's in the church. I hear she has a fine behind."

"Yeah, me too. So, Me Llamo, what do you do?"

"What did you call me?"

"Me Llamo. That's your name, isn't it?"

Over the next half an hour, Leon learned the difference between Spanish phrases and names. He also learned that Luis was a cop.

"Hey! I used to be a cop, too!" Leon said, thrilled at meeting someone with the same job as himself, "But only for a day."

"Yeah, on 'Take Your Kid to Work Day'? I was a real cop, kid. In Madrid. Hey, that rhymes!"

"No, really! Ever heard of Raccoon City?"

"No."

"Oh. Then, never mind."

Just then, a villager entered the cabin, dragging a large axe. "Me llamo Don Pedro," the twitchy villager said in Spanish, "You killed my brother, filthy American pig-dog. Prepared to die!"

"What'd he say?" Leon asked Luis, he was frantically trying to escape the ropes holding him.

"He said move, you idiot! Didn't the axe tell you that much?"

"Say what? Now, I don't think…whoa!" Leon dodged the axe just as it swung down an inch from his head. The force of the axe blow gouged a hole in the floor, which caused the foundation of the cabin to become unstable and, as a result, the entire building crashed to the ground, crushing everything and everyone inside and leaving a neat little circle around the unscathed Leon and Luis.

"Well, that was fortunate," Luis muttered as he dusted himself off.

"Hey! Where's my jacket?" was Leon's first statement as he stood up after this near-death experience.

"Look, Leon, it's been real, but I gotta jet," Luis said suddenly, "Catch you on the flip side. Oh, and watch out for that parasite egg inside you. It's a killer. Haha!" And he bolted away from the collapsed house and vanished into thin air.

Just as Leon began to feel sad that he had lost his newest friend, he was distracted by a new person: a shortish guy dressed in a black trench coat with piercing ice-blue eyes. "H'lo, strangah!" the man said in a lower-class British accent, possibly Cockney, but we, as authors don't wish to offend by assuming, "Got somethin' ye may like!"

"Shineys?" Leon's eyes lit up as he followed the scary man behind the ruins of the house like a giddy puppy. "I wanna see the shineys!" he drooled at the Merchant.

"Got some rare things on sale, strangah!" said the scary man. And with a broad gesture, he flung open his coat.

God knows why Leon didn't shoot the guy right there, let alone in the first place. The blonde American who formerly wore the snappy bomber jacket was so trigger-happy, he'd already tried to shoot every moving thing he'd run into on this little mission, from genial village people to cows to trees moving in the wind. But perhaps it was the Merchant's promise of possibly dangerous toys coupled with the fact that the man was a walking military arsenal that stayed Leon's bullet.

"Holy Jumping Jackrabbits!" Leon breathed in awe, "How much is the kick-ass machine gun?"

"It's 100,000 pesetas, strangah."

Leon quickly counted all the money he had, ahem, borrowed to this point. "Hmm, 1,000 pesetas, eh? What can I get with that?"

The Merchant laughed scornfully.

"No, really. What can I get? The mine thrower?"

The Merchant wordlessly help up an empty handgun bullet cartridge.

"So not even the rocket launcher?"

Cue scornful laugh.

By now, Leon's patience had run out. He held up his gun and cocked it, "Last chance. Are you gonna give me the exploding crossbow launcher or not?"

The Merchant sighed, "Look, son. I stand here day in an' day out, sellin' people stuff. I don't even remember how many times people have threatened to shoot me over something. I ain't afraid of ye. I'll give ye the rifle, because ye'll need it soon, but no rocket launcher, mate."

The single gunshot echoed around the canyon and the Merchant fell to the ground with melodramatic groan. Leon sighed and put his gun away. "You baby," he said to the unmoving Merchant, "I only shot you once and in the foot. Now, whaddya say about that rocket launcher?"

Silence.

Leon bent over and nudged the Merchant. Then he checked his pulse. "Oh, for the love of Mike," Leon muttered as he picked up the rifle from where the Merchant had dropped it, "One shot and he's dead. Seriously, what a whiner."

Leon walked to a low wall in front of the wreck of the cabin and the Merchant's corpse. He shouldered the gun, Rambo-style, and began picking off the villagers in the mine town beyond with all the skill of a spastic legally blind monkey. Fortunately for Leon, the villagers were also quite stupid and most of them accidentally fell off the boardwalks and/or walked into dynamite traps. When the mine was empty, Leon made his way through the twisted pathways, through some random buildings, got stuck in several bear traps, and found himself outside a house that (surprise!) looked like a building straight out a survival horror movie. Or game. Or…well, you get it.

So Leon climbed the back stairs, cracked the wildly difficult lock puzzle and found himself in a room that actually wasn't caked in dirt. Leon was so stunned by this, he could do nothing but gape at the cheap chintz-esque curtains on the window and the shelf of books that he didn't have time to read at the moment. But mostly, the ginormous picture of the big ol' bald guy with the glass eye in a little mini-shrine on the far side of the room.

Leon stared at the picture. He had seen more of these around and dozens of this silly hooded man who looked suspiciously like Senator Palpatine in Return of the Jedi. Leon hoped he didn't run into the guy; he had left his light saber at home.

After relieving the room of its money and green herbs, Leon went out another door and found another picture of Senator Palpatine staring at him from the wall. Leon pointed his gun at the picture and made gun noises as he pretended to shoot it. "Pfew, pfew!" Leon giggled, "I'll git you, Black Bart!" Suddenly, he heard a noise behind him. He turned just in time to see a massive pair of hands dive toward his neck.

Bitores "Big Cheese" Mendez stared at the writhing blonde American _sans_ snappy bomber jacket he now held about a food above the floor. The American's eyes turned an eerie shade of red and Mendez laughed. "You carry the same blood as us, filthy American pig-dog. Serves you right for killing my villagers."

"But…but they…zombies!" Leon managed to squeak out through his constricted windpipe.

Mendez tossed Leon to the floor. "Fool," he spat, "There are no zombies in this game. This is Resident Evil 4, radically different than the former games in the series for many reasons, such as the greatly improved camera and aiming system and the notable Lack. Of. Zombies."

Leon gaped, "What are you talking? This isn't a game. This is real life, dude."

Mendez shook his head in frustration, "Whatever. You are still an outsider and we are going to kill you ASAP. So watch yourself." He backed away from Leon, the first two fingers on his right hand pointed at Leon, Robert deNiro/Meet the Parents style. He backed into the doorframe and stumbled, swore colorfully in Spanish, and disappeared into the bedroom Leon had just come from.

Leon got to his feet, eyeing the closed door nervously. "Same blood," he muttered, "But, like, everyone has O neg. blood…"

Leon's walkie-talkie crackled and he clicked the video on. He grinned at Hunnigan's unsmiling face, "Hey, Ingrid sweetie! What's shakin'?"

"Don't give me any of that shit," Hunnigan snapped, "What the hell happened to reporting in after every important cut scene?"

_Cut scene?_ "Look, babe. It's been busy here. I can't call you every twenty minutes. I just…I just need my space. Is that too much to…"

"Shut up," Hunnigan retorted, "I don't care about your whiny little excuses. Tell me what's going on."

"Um, I shot more zombies, met a talking rock, got tetnus from several thousand bear traps, met a psychic Spaniard, shot a merchant, and some more zombies, went…"

"Why do I even bother?" Hunnigan muttered under her breath, "My mother warned me… Join the Secret Service and you'll have to work with shallow, clinically insane good-looking men, but did I listen? Of course not…"

"Oh, and I found out that I have the same blood as the Big Cheese. But isn't everyone in the world O negative?"

"I don't know what you're talking about," Hunnigan sighed, "And I'm sure I do't want to know. But maybe the…Big Cheese? Who talks like that? Anyway, maybe his comment has something to do with the fact that they injected a mind-control parasite into you."

"They did?"

"Yes. Remember the giant needle?"

"Um…I thought that was heroin."

"…Valid point. Anyway, enough chit-chat. You need to go back into that room and demand that the Village Chief let Ashley go."

"Isn't that a bad idea Why would I want to follow that guy into an enclosed area with no way of escape?"

"Because hopefully he'll kill you and I won't have to deal with you anymore. Also, you forgot the key to the church back there."

"Damn! Well, if you say so, hot stuff. Leon, signing out."

"…I hope he rips your face off."

Leon pushed open the door, fully not expecting what happened next. Before Leon even had time to react, Mendez had thrown Leon to the ground and planted his 500-pound boot on his chest.

"I did _not_ see that coming!" Leon shouted to no one in particular.

"You must have a death wish, _amigo_," Mendez leered down at Leon.

"But Hunnigan told me to!" Leon whined pathetically. Mendez ignored his pitiful pleas and pressed down with his foot. Leon desperately reached for his gun to no avail. Nothing could save him now.

Just then, because I'm only on Chapter 3 and there are probably going to be fifty million of these babies, Leon was saved. By a miracle. In a slutty red dress.

The miracle was hanging outside the cheaply chintz-ed window. She whistled and fired her gun at Mendez. It popped him in the shoulder, but he didn't seem to even notice. Instead, he completely forgot the fact that he had one intruder currently ready for the kill and he catapulted himself out of the window at the intruder that was far more likely to escape. The dame in the red dress retracted her not-so-hidden grappling gun and disappeared onto the roof.

"Hey!" Leon jumped up and ran to the window, "Nice jump, Mr. Big Cheese!" He stepped back and addressed the picture, "And I thought I was the only one with a window-jumping fetish…"

Suddenly, a thought occurred to him. "Hey, that babe in the red dress…I've seen her before…" His mind raked through the millions of women he had met in his lifetime, the thousands that he knew by name, the few that were still on speaking terms with him, but try as he might, he couldn't think of it.

"Oh, well," Leon said, twirling his gun around his finger. Just because he doesn't learn. "Oh, well. I'm sure she'll be back." Leon left the room with the assurance that, hell yes, he was a hot piece of man. Then he realized he had forgotten the key again, turned back around and slammed straight into the closed door and passed out.

* * *

_A/N - Please note: I did not, do not, and will never own any of the following: Resident Evil 4, James Bond, Macgyver, Meet the Parents, or Star Wars. Suing me will result in receiving a settlement of a few quarters, as that is currently all the money I have. I might forget to type this in other chapters, so this officially applies to the entire story. ;-)  
_

_ A/N (reprise) - Wow, I'm really cruising on writing this thing... I have one more chapter completely written that I will post today too, and I have another in the works, so, yeah. Thank you all so much for your awesome reviews! I'm so glad you like my story! Please keep reading and keep reviewing!_ _Next chapter: Eggs of Death and the Del Lago!_


	5. Ch 4: Eggs of Doom!

**Chapter 4: Eggs of Doom**

Leon awoke to the sound of chickens. "Mom, just give me five more minutes," he groaned as he reached out to grab Mr. Binky. For some reason, Mr. Binky was covered in feathers and squawked loudly when Leon squeezed him.

Leon opened his eyes. "Gah!" he shouted at the brown chicken in his arms, "Mr. Binky! What happened to you?"

The chicken squawked again in response and leaped out of Leon's arms. Leon watched it run down the stairs and he remembered where he was. Sort of. "I'm supposed to be…getting a key for something…a church? Ah, well. I'll find out soon enough."

Leon bounced to his feet and headed down the stairs, forgetting the key for a third time. He ran back upstairs, finally got the blasted key and went out the front door of the house.

Something was out there. Someone. He could sense it; with his keen secret agent sense of…whatever it is secret agents are good at sensing, danger, I guess, nothing could hide from him. And then he saw him. A man with a potato bag over his head. He was as big as an elephant without shoes on a blacktopped road in the middle of July and was probably as mean as that, too. Leon's eyes narrowed in anticipation. He was ready. The blow to his head seemed to have jarred something loose, maybe his sense of fear? He didn't know and he didn't care. All he knew was that Potato Sack Head over there was going down.

Something was out there. Someone. He could sense it; with his keen Spanish villager sense of…whatever it is Spanish villagers from this particular town are good at sensing, manure from the looks of the town, nothing could hide from him. Then he saw him. The blonde American whose snappy bomber jacket had been purloined by Jose. The chainsaw man's eyes probably narrowed in anticipation. We can't know for sure because he was wearing a potato sack over his head. Why? We dunno. For some reason, the potato sack seemed to be made of steel and it increased the chainsaw man's health by 90 gazillion, so Mr. Chainsaw Man was nearly impossible to kill without several atomic bombs. But Leon didn't know this. Mr. Chainsaw Man laughed. This was going to be fun.

Leon made the first move. He shot once at the man with the chainsaw and missed. Leon's blood (the very same blood as the village chief, it may be worth noticing) ran cold as he heard the revving of the chainsaw. "Oh, shit," he said."

Then the chainsaw man ran at Leon, his chainsaw raised. Leon shot everything he had at the guy, all the while screaming, "AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!" in a fairly threatening manner.

Still, the chainsaw man kept coming. Leon pulled his trigger. Nothing came out. He was empty. "Double shit," he said as he ducked back into the house. He slammed the flimsy balsa wood door behind him and ran back through the house screaming, "AAAAAAAAAAAAA!" in a very not-threatening manner.

In a panic, he ran through the house to the bathroom behind the stairs. Now, really this was not a true bathroom. There was only a urinal and (I think) some toilet paper. Clearly not a suitable bathroom for anyone, especially not someone of the female gender. One wonders why this particular remote Spanish village is so gender-discriminatory.

Anyway, so Leon ran into the bathroom. The chicken was there, pecking idly at something Leon didn't care to know about. "Chicken," he whispered to the chicken, "What do I do? I can't die until after I save whoever it is I'm supposed to save and then get a date with Hunnigan! Help me!"

The chicken gave Leon a scornful glance, as if to say, "Help yourself, you sissy girly-man," and it laid an egg, just to send the point home.

Leon picked up the egg and sighed, "You stupid chicken. What am I supposed to do with this? Make an omelet for Colonel Crazypants out…"

He heard the sound of the chainsaw getting closer and suddenly, he had an idea. "I'd get out of the way, if I were you, Chicken," he advised the chicken, "This could get dangerous."

"Bawk!" said the chicken.

Leon listened to the sound of the chainsaw and when it sounded close, Leon threw open the door.

Mr. Chainsaw Man heard the door open and whirled to face the sound. He might have grinned, we really don't know (see previous note) and he stalked slowly toward the bathroom as he was taught in Crazed Power-Tool Wielding Maniacs 101.

Suddenly, he froze, his chainsaw purring like a cat, if a cat consisted of a motorized rotating series of razor sharp teeth. Slowly, he processed what was in the blonde American's hand and panic began to creep into his mind.

But before the panic could form into anything real, Leon threw the egg. It splattered on the chainsaw man's chest in an interesting pattern of shell, yolk, and albumen. Everything stood still for a moment: Leon, Chainsaw Man, Chicken, until without warning, the chainsaw man spontaneously combusted, leaving only a black scorch mark and a silent chainsaw behind.

"Huh," was all Leon had to say about that, "That's interesting. Thanks, Chicken." The chicken pointedly ignored him. Leon shrugged and left the house after finding 87 cases of handgun ammo behind the toilet paper.

Outside the house, Leon promptly stepped in a bear trap.

After freeing himself from the trap and making a mental note to get yet another tetanus shot upon returning to the states, Leon continued on and found himself somewhere familiar.

"Ah, damn!" Leon swore, "Not this place again! I already stole…I mean, found the money from here!"

Thankfully, a gaggle of villagers appeared and Leon was able to collect several hundred more pesetas, just to make the trip worthwhile and all. He also spent a few minutes gleefully collecting some eggs he found on the ground of the farm sector of the village. When he had shot all the farm animals and collected everything he could, he moved on to the church in the center of town.

The Bingo sign on the village chapel had been replaced with one that read: _This is not the front door to the building that leads to the church. There is not plot advancement through this not-front door._ This new sign had a big arrow on it that pointed to the door below, which was labeled _Front door_.

"If that's not the door, then how do I get through?" Leon whined, "And where's the plot advancement point then?" He considered calling Hunnigan, but he wasn't much in the mood to hit on anyone right now, even if the woman totally wanted him the way Hunnigan did. So he set out to crack the door puzzle on his own.

Amazingly, it only took him half an hour to figure out that the key Hunnigan had told him to use to unlock the church door was used to unlock the church door. Thoroughly pleased with himself, Leon opened the door and walked in to find himself in: a run-down shack.

"Hey!" Leon said, "Where's the church?" He frowned. In Leon-World, when you walk into a church, you're in a church. But apparently, that's not how things work in Spain. Grumbling, Leon went through the back door and found a ladder leading to a secret passage. This cheered him up considerably. Secret passages fun stuff, in Leon's mind.

And the secret passage was fun. Until Leon came across a room lit by a blue torch and populated by a short-ish man dressed in a black trench coat. "Welcome!" he exclaimed in that same accent and threw open his coat, "Got some rare things on sale, strangah!"

"Oh, no," Leon groaned and slapped his forehead with his palm, "Not you again! I thought I killed you! You know I hate you, right?"

"What're ye sellin'?" the Merchant asked, eager to buy things to not sell back to other people, like a normal Merchant would do.

"Nothing. I hate you."

"What're ye buyin'?"

"I can't afford anything, you…ooh! I can buy the first aid spray!"

"Is that all, strangah?"

"Yes. Gimmie, gimmie, gimmie!" Leon hugged the first aid spray like it was Mr. Binky as the Merchant laughed, "Come back anytime."

Eyeing the Merchant suspiciously, Leon clutched his newly purchased first aid spray as if the Forces of Hell Itself were after it and he edged past the possibly smiling Merchant (see note on Chainsaw Man; substitute "potato bag" with "hood and scarf covering everything except eyes") and down the tunnel. At the end, he found himself in a graveyard on a hill with a big ol' church on the summit.

"Score!" Leon shouted and he sprinted up the hill, football-smashing any nearby villagers as he went, "I knew there was a church and a plot advancement point this way!"

Leon's excitement faltered as he reached the front door of the church and discovered a decided lack of handles. "Oh, that's practical," Leon said dryly, "What the hell kind of church doesn't have handles on the doors? There must be a key to fit in this weird indentation on the door…"

At that moment, who should call but everyone's favorite ice queen, Hunnigan! "Leon, status report."

"Good news or bad news first?"

"Good."

"Eggs make good explosive devices and I found the church."

"Ookay…what's the bad news?"

"The door to the church is locked."

"Isn't that the first thing they teach you in cop school, how to pick locks?"

"Yeah, right after the lessons on how to hotwire a car and disarm a security system. Hunnigan, we cops don't pick locks, we shoot the crap out of them and they fall off. There's a peculiar indentation on the door, though. Do you think…?"

"You need a key. Leon, get that key. Ashley's waiting. Hunnigan, out!"

"Ashley…why does that name sound familiar?" Leon pondered this matter over as he shot all the blue things down from around the graveyard. When he had finished with this, he had completely forgotten about trying to remember who Ashley was. Instead, he walked down a boardwalk over a deep gorge, through a large paved area (which, according to the strategy guide at Borders is a quarry, but we, as writers, consider this to be a hugemongous stretch of the imagination) and stopped by the Merchant's underground shop. There, the Merchant gave him a free gun and Leon used the typewriter to move the Merchant into his Top 8 on MySpace. After this, he made his way through a rather vile area of swampland to finally find himself on the edge of some random lake.

So here is Leon on a cliff overlooking this so-called "lake" (more like a cesspool, if you ask me) and there is a boat on the lake. Random Villagers A and B on the boat proceed to drop Standard Issue Spanish Cop #2 into the water, much to Leon's horror.

"Shit!" Leon said under his breath, "I didn't get to check his pockets for cash and/or the car keys!" He considered diving off the cliff and raiding the cop's pockets. That is, until a fish the size of Tibet ate the Spanish Cop, Villagers A and B, and the boat, all in one gulp and dove back under the water.

Leon simply stared at the glassy lake surface. "Well, ha ha, that's my cue to leave!" He got up to head back to the front of the game and promptly got his leg caught in a bear trap. No! Haha! Just kidding! Although he did trip on a rock.

Leon took the rock-tripping-on to be a sign that if he didn't fight the giant fish and save the girl with the allegedly nice ass, he would not be able to get out of the country. So, grudgingly, he walked down to the lakefront and found a boat with an unlimited supply of harpoons in it. He sighed, got in the boat, and sailed out to the middle of the lake

"Okay, Fish," he called out over the lake, "Come out here. I want to talk to you."

Ominous music filled the air, music that sounded vaguely reminiscent of the theme from Jaws and Leon sighed again. A low rumbling sounded from under the water. Leon watched as a dark shape rose and gradually took the form of the giant fish.

"My name," the fish said in a vaguely feminine voice, "is Karen and I would appreciate it if you weren't so rude about meeting me. It is people like you who perpetuate the myth that giant fish are evil."

"Well, you did just eat three people and a boat," Leon replied.

The fish retorted indignantly, "It doesn't count if the person's dead. You and I both can agree on this, can we not? And those other guys were just asking for it."

"Fair enough," Leon said, "They were zombies, after all."

"What do you want?" Karen asked, eager to be rid of the blonde American who formerly owned the snappy bomber jacket.

"Well, uh, I guess I just wanted to make sure you won't eat me if I try to cross the lake."

"Honey," Karen said, "I could have eaten you almost fifty times by now. Fifty-one. Fifty-two. And I haven't, have I?"

"Uh, no. Thanks for that, by the way."

"Don't mention it, kid," Karen said as she dove back under the water, "Good luck with that blonde sissy girl with the mediocre butt."

"Wait, it's mediocre?" But Karen was already gone. Sighing yet again, Leon drove the boat to the opposite shore, got out, and fainted dead away.

* * *

_A/N: Haha! So far at the end of almost every chapter, Leon has found some excuse or another to pass out. I tried to make him less of a complete idiot in this chapter, but it's just so much fun! In case anyone's wondering, I really do like Leon's character. It just isn't any fun to not make him an idiot. Again, thanks for the reviews!_  



	6. Ch 5: Point A to Point B

**Chapter 5: In which Leon goes from Point A to Point B and gets his face devoured by several creepy animals in the process.  
**

Leon woke up to find himself inside a shack right near the lake where he had dueled the giant fish. Or reasoned with Karen, whichever you prefer. His head kind of hurt and as he tried to stand up, he was overcome by a coughing fit. When he looked at his hand, he saw that he had coughed up a handful of rich, red blood.

"Well, that can't be good," Leon remarked simply.

As he tried to decide whether to do something about his bloody glove or go find the nearest bar and get smashed, Hunnigan called.

"Where have you been?" Hunnigan demanded as Leon turned on the walkie-talkie, "It's been six hours since your last check-in!"

"Aww, you were counting? I didn't know you cared that much," Leon winked at her, "I'm here now, pumpkin. Whatcha want?"

"Status report," Hunnigan said through gritted teeth.

"I reasoned with a giant fish and am now coughing up blood. But beyond that, we're all good."

"Coughing up blood!"

"Yeah, I don't get it either. Talk about weird. But it's nothing a good shot or two can't help."

"Leon, this is serious! Coughing up blood is a bad sign!"

"Aww, it's sweet that you care, babe."

"I don't care. In fact, I hope you die. After you save Ashley, of course."

"C'mon, you dig me. You know it."

Hunnigan hit Leon with her full-on Female Glare of Death and then hung up on him. Leon grinned, "Hard-to-get. That's cool."

Suddenly, the affereffects of the Glare of Death kicked in and for a moment, Leon's mind was filled with doubt. Could it be that Hunnigan was not attracted to him? What were the odds that most women were not attracted to him? Was it possible that he was not the hot piece of man he thought, no, knew he was?

"Nah," Leon said to no one in particular. He smiled self-assuredly and walked out into the lake-port area. In the six or so hours of Leon's unconsciousness, the Powers that Be decided that the plot had advanced enough to bring rain into the story. Just to, y'know, reinforce the survival horror aspect of the story. Also, rain makes a great foreshadowing device. Which Leon was about to discover.

"Dang, rain sure came up fast," Leon remarked as he walked down yet another narrow canyon, "It's a good thing I lost my snappy bomber jacket when I did, otherwise the leather construction would have been… oh, damn."

Ahead on the path stood two not-zombie villagers. Leon sighed. He still wasn't convinced that these guys weren't zombies, no matter what the Big Cheese said as he was crushing his (Leon's) chest with his 5 million pound foot. But zombie or not, these guys were getting old.

"Grawr!" said the not-zombie villagers.

"Blam blam," said Leon's gun.

"Holy shit crackers!" said Leon in an exclamatory manner. For when Leon's bullets had hit the two villagers in the head, their heads had exploded to reveal two crazy wiggling bug things with large tentacles tipped with little knives or sharp-edged blades or whatever. Basically, it was kind of freaky.

"Well," Leon laughed awkwardly, "I guess you guys really aren't zombies after all. Uh, my mistake! Hey, sorry about all those people I killed back there in the first four chapters… You wanna just let bygones be bygones?"

The villagers responded by pacing closer and swiping at Leon's head with their tentacle blades.

"I guess that's a no, then," Leon said as he whipped out his shotgun (yeah, remember that puppy?) and blasted the Wigglepods off the villager's heads.

Leon eased past the guys, rappelled down a cliff, solved some stupid water mill puzzle that is FAR too uneventful to warrant discussion here, shot some more crazy-head-exploding-into-insects villagers and FINALLY! got the damn church key. Fortunately for him, there was a conveniently placed boat just beyond that allowed him to teleport back to the Merchant's shop back by that "quarry" (whatever).

Leon's recent successes had made him giddy with confidence. He went into the "quarry" whistling…_some song_ with all the tonal accuracy of a lawnmower with a cold. But even Leon's tone-deafness couldn't help him with what happened next.

As soon as Leon stepped into the "quarry", the gates over both exits slammed shut. Leon's keen secret agent sense told him that this could be yet another foreshadowing device and that this could be a problem. They neglected to mention, however, that Leon probably could have fit through the spaces of the gates and that he had about 500 incendiary grenades at this point. But whatever. That would be no fun!

"Uh, hmm," Leon mused out loud, "So now I'm trapped in a small area with no way to escape. That must mean it's time for a battle!"

As if on cue, a loud roar rent the air (actually it was; the cue for scary roar was "trapped", but the creature supplying the roar was a few crayons short of a box, if you know what I mean, and sometimes took longer to process things) and a giant beast somewhat akin to those trolls from The Lord of the Rings: The Second One, or Was It the Third One? ran through a wooden door, plowed over a few random villagers and turned its focus directly on Leon. It stared stupidly at Leon, scratching its head in confusion.

At that moment, Leon had an epiphany. "Maybe," he thought silently as the idea slowly came into focus, "If I can't see it, it can't see me… Yes! That's it!" With swift action, Leon put his plan into motion. He covered his eyes with his hands and held his breath.

For a while, nothing happened. Leon could barely control his giggling, so happy was he that he was indeed the genius that he knew himself to be. At this rate, the El Gigante couldn't touch him! It was brilliant! Right until a tree trunk the size of Waco, Texas slammed down an inch from Leon's head.

Leon opened his eyes and nervously eyed the tree trunk. Then his gaze drifted to the El Gigante. The beast was grinning vacantly at Leon, waiting for something… What Leon didn't know is that the El Gigante was waiting for praise from the blonde American in the black short-sleeved Spandex for a job well done. Leon, not knowing this, ran screaming to the other side of the compound.

"Hey," said one dying generic Spanish villager near the El Gigante's cave, "Isn't 'the El Gigante' kind of redundant?"

"Yeah, I think so," replied another dismembered Spanish villager, "I am a great scholar of the Spanish language and I'm pretty sure…"

At that moment, a giant rock crushed both men and Leon ran screaming past the rock, waving his hands in the air.

Suddenly, Leon stopped. _I can't do this_, he thought, _this is unmanly_! "And I, Leon Scott Kennedy, am a man! I do not cry!" He struck a heroic pose and was knocked backward into the mud by a flying VW Beetle. Don't ask me why.

The El Gigante laughed. This was fun!

Leon pushed himself up. His face was caked with mud (it is raining, after all) and tears streamed down his cheeks. For in the palm of his left hand was a splinter; so tiny that I can barely see it and I, I mean we are the author. Ahem.

Leon's vision blurred from the tears as a hot anger rose in him. His vision turned red and he got to his feet and chucked his shotgun over his shoulder. He wouldn't need it where he was going.

"Okay, Gigant-ee," Leon growled at the beast, "Get ready to rumble."

For the sake of space and slight boredom with trying to come up with battle scenes, we will now fast-forward through the Leon v. Gigante battle. Uh, yeah…there's the Gigante roaring, Leon hacking with his knife, stuff happening, looks like a yellow herb has joined the fight, there's the WHOA! What was that? Where's that remote? Go back! Go back! Dammit, no! I pressed the button, why won't you stop, you stupid thing? Aaargh!

Five minutes later, Leon stood over the mangled body of the El Gigante, a triumphant smile on his (Leon's) face. He scooped the the 50,000 pesetas that had mysteriously been hidden up the El Gigante's nose and pressed the Secret Garage Door Opener of Doom that had been there the whole time with a big neon sign over it labeling it as such. Leon left the compound, whistling horrendously as he returned to the church.

The church was exactly as Leon had left it: big, dark, scary, church-y, and locked. New additions included huge puddles thanks to the rain, and a handful of dogs at the cemetery's back entrance. "Puppies!" Leon cried happily when he saw the dogs and he scampered toward the dogs, his arms outstretched.

The dogs saw Leon shortly after his cry of excitement. The followed him with their eyes as he came closer until…

"Holy shit!" Leon muttered under his breath as the dogs' backs exploded into writhing Wigglepods, "They've even got to the puppies. Is nothing sacred anymore? Is forever just another word?"

For a second, neither dog nor blonde American moved. Then, Leon sprinted for the church door, screaming all the way as the dogs chased after him, their abnormally large mouths leaving spit trails the size of oil spills behind them.

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!" said Leon.

"Snarl growl slobber slobber snarl!" said the dogs, close on Leon's heels.

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!" retorted Leon.

"Leon? What's going on! Status report!" said Hunnigan.

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA (deep breath) AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!" reported Leon.

"What?" said Hunnigan.

"Click," said the lock on the church door.

"Growl slobber snarl bark bark snarl growl slobber slobber growl," said the dogs.

"AAAAAAAAAAAAouch!" said Leon as he fell onto the cold stone floor of the church and kicked the door shut behind him. He lay there, rubbing his head as he took in his surroundings.

The church was nothing special. Stone construction, stained glass, pews, random barrels of items, you know. The usual. But up on the…

"Leon!" Hunnigan said sharply, "What are you doing? Are you in the church yet?"

"You know," Leon replied as he made his way to the altar, "For someone who supposedly hates me, you sure call a lot. Are you sure you secretly don't love me?"

"It is my job to call you, dumbass," Hunnigan said coldly, "Now, are you in the church? I have some important information."

"Sure am, babe," Leon said casually as he inspected the altar. He had managed to find several secret stashes of pesetas and was now eyeing the strange icon that literally wallpapered the entire altar, "Hey, Ingrid, baby. I'm thinkin' this is some kind of cult…"

"Here's my information," Hunnigan said, "You may not know it, but this place is owned by a cult called the Los Illuminados. I'll send you a picture of their icon, so you'll know it when you see it. You probably haven't seen any yet, but here it is."

"Los IlluminadosI'llsendyouapictureoftheiriconsoyou'llknowitwhenyouseeit? That's a mouthful," Leon remarked, "What a stupid name for a cult."

"…Yeah, well. Now you know."

"So, Ingie, sweetie, honey, kitten," Leon said as he climbed up a secret hidden ladder off to one side of the altar and began exploring, "What say you and me go out after I get off work here and…hello? Hunnigan?"

Leon put away his walkie-talkie, magically jumped onto the chandelier that hung about 5 feet from any wall, turned a corner, and fell to his knees in horror. There, in front of him, was the worst locking device he could ever have imagined. A little computer console with three knobs stood facing that big-ass symbol on the wall above the altar. Leon knew it could only be one thing: a friggin' light puzzle.

Which was a major problem for our blonde American in the short-sleeved Spandex and with an advanced case of tuberculosis. Because Leon was colorblind.

Leon gingerly walked up to the controls and began spinning them randomly. For all he knew, the light was turning, but he couldn't really see it enough to know what was going on. After about an hour and a half of colorful (haha!) swearing, Leon finally backed up and shot the hell out of the machine. Then he found the gates that the stupid puzzle unlocked and he chucked his 500 million incendiary grenades at it. The heat from the grenades managed to twist the metal enough so Leon could just barely squeeze through.

On the other side of the gate was a single wooden door. A big sign hung on the door, again written in English and reading, "President's Daughter Containment Room – Please Keep this Door Closed". Below those letters, someone had scrawled with a purple Crayola marker, "There iz no prezedent's dauter here. Go awai."

Leon read the signs and shrugged, "They must have moved her. Oh, well! Back to go shoot some more villagers!" He turned and began to walk away, but stopped at the bars, "Wait…wait just a minute…" He turned and looked back at the signs, "Maybe there's some more handgun ammo in there…"

Leon began to cautiously push open the door, then changed his mind. "F that," he said to the stone wall, "I'm a secret agent, bitches! I don't need to gently push open any stinkin' doors!" He backed off and let the door close again, then kicked it as hard as he could square in the middle of the door. The door didn't move and Leon collapsed to the floor in excruciating pain, gripping his twisted ankle.

With suave deftness, Leon whipped out a bottle of first aid spray and lost his grip on it. It slipped from his fingers and rolled off the edge of the second story. Swearing, Leon rummaged through his hugemongous briefcase that he just randomly carried around for any kind of healing thing. All he had left was a dozen eggs. _Can't hurt to try, I guess_, Leon thought to himself. He pulled out an egg and ate the entire thing, shell and all. As if by divine will, his leg immediately got better. Leon got to his feet and executed a complicated floor gymnastics routine in the little hallway before moving back to the door. This time, he kicked the door above the doorknob and the door fell to the floor with a crash.

Suddenly, Leon's secret agent senses began to tingle. "Duck!" Leon's brain shouted at him. "What?" Leon replied as a flying two-by-four slammed into his forehead, knocking him out into the hallway like a ton of wet flour.

"OMG!" whined a female voice from inside the room, "I think I just killed a hot guy! Why does this always happen to me!"

"Waiter," Leon slurred incoherently, "I'd like to order a giant plate of sautéed hula hoops and please take the purple kitty outside, if you please…" Then he passed out cold for the, what is this, 500th time this fanfic?

"Uhh…" the whiny blonde girl stepped into the doorway to stare at the unconscious stupid man, "I wonder this will keep him from dating me after he saves my sorry butt…"

* * *

_A/N: This is a short chapter... I was going to have it go up to after Saddler's speech, but I was suddenly struck by a massive case of writer's block. Or unmotivation. Either way, I will try super-hard to get the next chapter written ASAP! However, it's almost the end of the semester, which means I need to sell my soul to my textbooks pretty soon. Bear with me if it takes a while!_

_ A/N, Part Deux: Just a reminder, I do not own any previously licensed people, places, things, franchises, movies, books, songs, whatever that I've mentioned in this. If you sue me, you will get the $2, trio of kiwis, and Altoids tin of bobby pins that are sitting on my desk right now. Definitely not worth the legal fees, IMHO.  
_


	7. Ch 6: Attack of the TwobyFours

**Chapter 6: Attack of the Two-by-Fours**

Leon woke up with a pounding headache and the certainty that he had been out cold for hours and hours. When he checked his watch, he was disappointed to find he'd only been unconscious for two minutes.

As he came back to the realm of the conscious, his eyes focused on a blonde blur standing in front of him. "Zombie," his mind cried dully and he tried to reach for his gun, but his hand wouldn't obey.

"Flurgle miffle floofle groofle blargh?" the blonde shape said. As Leon watched, the blob came into focus, taking on the appearance of a blonde girl. She cocked her head curiously, "Hey, are you okay? Sorry about that piece of wood…"

"Who are you?" Leon grumbled. His head was pounding as if he had a hangover. And he knew only one cure for a hangover. "Got any booze, sweet cheeks?"

"What!" the girl shrieked in an annoyingly whiny voice. The rock way back in…the second chapter, I think. Or the third. Anyway, that rock had been right about the irritating part.

"You know, alcohol. Booze. Moonshine. Rotgut. Spirits. You've got to know what I'm talking about. You got any?"

"What kind of rescuer are you!"

"Look, babe. I ain't here to rescue you," Leon said, eyeing the girl suspiciously, "You can come with if you want, but you'd better keep up or I'll shoot you dead where you stand."

The girl gulped.

"Nah, I'm just kidding," Leon grinned, "I won't shoot you. Come on." He jumped to his feet and walked out of the room, the girl following close behind.

"Um, my name is Ashley," the girl said after a little while.

"Yeah, yeah," Leon dismissed her attempts at conversation, "Whatever. Is it all right if I call you babycakes? Great. Let's go."

Ashley opened her mouth to protest, but Leon was already walking away. She glared darkly at him, watched him for a moment, then shrugged. "He's hot," she thought, "And possibly single. I don't need 'em smart. I can take it."

By the time Ashley caught up to Leon, he had already hurled himself back down to the first floor. Because only sissies use ladders to go down. Duh. Apparently, Ashley agreed with this statement, because rather than climb down the ladder like a normal person, she stood at the top o the ledge and yelled, "Leon! Leon, come catch me!"

Leon sighed. "What h e hell is wrong with you? He shouted back at the blonde-ish girl, who cringed and made a pouty face in response, "Is there a reason why you can't just jump down here like any norm…well, somewhat normal person?"

"Uh, yeah," Ashley said in her best ditzy girl voice, "I'm wearing a _skirt_." She pointed vehemently at her skirt, just in case Leon didn't get it.

Leon rolled his eyes contemptuously, "Whatev, baby. See you later then." Ashley gaped unbelievingly as Leon kept walking, leaving her stranded.

Leon walked in fast-motion (a.k.a. ran) into the main part of the church and stopped suddenly when he noticed someone on the altar. The man from all those paintings, the guy who looked like a dead-on impression of Senator Palpatine in The Return of the Jedi stood on the altar, brandishing his strange wiggly staff. "I'll take the girl," he said, gesturing with one hand. His gesture stopped short when he noticed the definite lack of girl in the room. "Where is the president's daughter?" he asked in a strangely accented voice, his accent mysteriously implacable by us authors.

"LEEEEEEEEOOOOOOON!" screamed Ashley from back by the ladder. Both Leon and Senator Palpatine ignored her.

"Well, she's…" Leon started to point to the ladder, but paused halfway. "Wait, president's daughter? That kid! And who the hell are you? How long have you been there?"

Senator Palpatine sighed, "I've been here since you came in. In fact, I waved and said hello to you as you came through the door. You just did not see me. You are either very focused or very blind.

"As for your other questions, those will be answered in my upcoming evil monologue," he continued, "But I must ask you first to go get the girl, as much of this monologue is dependent on her presence."

"Wait, what?" Leon said, still lost back on '…since you came in.'

"He said to get the chick, you moron!" said a crossbowman from his secret hiding spot, "We don't got all day!"

Leon signed and gazed languidly back at Ashley, "Do I hafta?"

"I'm afraid so," Palpatine said sadly, "I would love to release her to you. We as a cult are becoming very irritated with her. Unfortunately, that would end the game and you haven't even killed off my crazy henchmen for me yet. I mean…toured my lovely castle!"

"Well, if you say so," Leon grudgingly walked back to where Ashley was complaining into her cell phone.

"That's right, Stacey! He just abandoned me! I just…what? Oh, God yes, he's hot! He must work out or something because…oh, way hotter than Travis. I know! I couldn't believe it too, but I'd say he's almost Grecian god standing! Yes, hotter than History 231 Nathan, too!" She noticed Leon watching her at the base of the ladder and she scowled darkly at him, "I mean no! He's ugly as sin! He's so ugly, I can barely look at him! Sick! I wouldn't date him, even if it were between him and Marvin from your boyfriend's CS class! Ick! That's disgusting! Look, Stacey, I g2g. This talking about that jerk-wad Leon is making me sick; I need to go vomit. I'll call you later. Bye!" She hung up and glared at Leon, "What do you want?"

"Senator Palpatine told me I need to get you down to advance the plot so I can kill people and tour some castle. So get your ass down here."

Ashley considered this. "Okay," she said finally, "Catch!" She jumped down and just as he was about to catch her, Leon turned away to check his watch. Ashley fell to the floor in a twitching mass of pain.

"Oh, sorry," Leon said blandly, "My bad. You all right, Angie?"

"It's Ashley, you good-looking twit," she said through gritted teeth, "I think I broke my legs in at least four places. Does it look like I'm okay?"

"Bah, you're fine," Leon scoffed, "Just shake it off and come on."

Back on the altar, the strange hooded man leaned against the table/cabinet thing, his hands flying madly. "Done!" he shouted, holding up a solved Rubik's cube," What was my time, Carlos?"

"Forty-six seconds, boss," said a crossbowman.

"Damn," Senator Palpatine cursed, "Slower. Let's do it again." He looked up as Leon stormed into the church, dragging a bruised and battered Ashley behind him. Senator Palpatine grinned evilly and brandished his Rubik's Cube in as violent a manner as one can manage with a Rubik's Cube. "I'll take the girl," he said in his Evil Dictator Voice ™.

"Who are you?" Leon exclaimed, completely stunned by the appearance of the hooded man that he could not remember seeing before in his life.

"I am Osmund Saddler," Palpatine (hereafter referred to as Saddler) said, "Leader of this fine terrorist breeding ground and den of conspiracy. Or cult. Or religious community. Whichever you prefer."

"Cult's good," Leon said, "It's shorter. Easier to remember." Ashley, having miraculously recovered in the past 30 seconds, stared wide-eyed at Leon, her mouth hanging open in astonishment.

"Okay, cult it is," Saddler made a note in a small notepad, "Change stationery to 'cult'. Okay. Back to business."

"What do you want?" Leon asked, falling back into Standard Hero in Distress Dialogue No. 41 ™.

If Saddler had had a mustache, that kind that Snidely Whiplash has in the old Dudley Do-Right cartoons, he would have twirled it gleefully at this point. _Time to reveal my brilliant plan!_ he giggled to himself. "Why, to take over the world, of course! What does any scary, vaguely foreign evil person ever want? No longer will the United States think they can police the world! So, logically, we kidnapped the president's daughter and…"

"That's right!" A thought resurfaced in Leon's mind and he whirled on Ashley, "You're the president's daughter? Why would you lie to me?"

"I didn't lie to you!" Ashley shrilled, "I never even got to tell you who I was, because apparently you're too stupid to figure it out from the picture that my daddy gave you!"

"Hey! It's not my fault that Spanish guy stole that picture! But you should have said something just the same!" Leon shouted, "I was totally going to shoot you!"

"WHAT!"

"Well, you're just so irritating…"

"I can't believe you! I'm totally going to tell my daddy on you and he…"

"As fascinating as your little lovers' spat is," Saddler interrupted, "May I continue revealing my entire evil plot?"

"Lovers' spat!" Leon sputtered angrily. Ashley blushed deeply and grinned at Leon, who glared at her, then surreptitiously eyed her behind. He nodded appreciatively and then went back to glaring at her.

Saddler continued, "Where was I? World domination…police the world…kidnap the girl…oh, yes. We kidnapped her and bestowed our little…gift upon her."

Ashley gasped, "Leon! I think they injected…"

"Shut up," Leon barked at her, his attention rapt on Saddler's words.

"We hope you enjoy our gift, little girl,' Saddler said evilly, "And of course, we'll send you home, back to your loving daddy."

"What's gonna happen to me?" Ashley asked in a small voice.

"Oh, after a while, your head will explode, releasing the giant parasite that now lives in your body. The parasite will come out, consume your body after a time, and lay its eggs in the entire population of the United States and within two weeks, we will move in and rename the United States 'Saddlerland'," Saddler said dismissively, as if this was a given, "We also gave you the same power, Mr. Unintelligent Blonde American Man Whose Snappy Bomber Jacket Was Stolen By Us…"

"Hey!"

"…and when the eggs hatch, you will be completely under my control, like little puppets on string, just like this." Saddler mimicked operating a marionette, getting into it so much, he began talking to his imaginary puppet, "Yes, you're under my control, aren't you? You bloodthirsty parasitically infested little invisible piece of wood and string. Moo ha ha!"

Leon and Ashley exchanged glances and collectively rolled their eyes. "That sounds more like an alien invasion to me," Leon pointed out, more as a fact than an accusation.

"Perhaps," said Saddler, "I do so enjoy your American movies about aliens. Especially that one… Alien Versus Predator? But one difference is this: do the aliens ever demand ransoms?"

"Uhh…"

"The answer is no. And we are going to keep Sorority Barbie here…"

"OMG! WTF, you jerk!"

"…and demand from her father…one billion dollars!"

"One billion dollars?"

"Yes," Saddler chuckled, "One billion dollars. Believe it or not, it takes a lot of money to keep an evil mind-controlling Spanish cult open. You know, Property taxes and such. Why? Do you think I should have asked for more?"

"Faith and money will get you nowhere, Saddler!" Leon shouted lamely. Ashley pretended she didn't know him.

"If you say so, Mr. Hot Shot Secret Service Agent," Saddler shrugged, "Fire!" The fire crossbowmen who were cleverly hidden in the church and were previously unnoticed by anyone in the room, shot a cluster of arrows at Leon and Ashley, who just stood there, confused. Luckily, every single arrow missed by at least two feet.

"This is the part where you run away," Saddler prompted gently.

"Oh," Leon laughed awkwardly, "Right." He picked up Ashley, threw her over his shoulder, and hurled himself through the nearest stained glass window.

"Damn!" shouted Saddler, "Those were authentic Tiffany stained glass! You'll pay for that, Mr. Shallow Super Secret Agent Spy Man!"

On the other side of the window was a little shed. We, as the author, aren't quite sure why the stained glass window led into a shed, nor why going into the shed made Leon and Ashley vanish from their enemies' sight. Perhaps the shed was a wormhole into the Fifth Dimension. Yeah, that works.

Back in the Fifth Dimension, Ashley was whining (again) and picking glass out of her face. "The door was six feet away," she complained, "Is there a reason you instead chose to jump through a wall of colored glass?"

"Think of it this way," Leon said, "If you had to choose between plain vanilla ice cream and General Tso's Crazy Suicidal Ice Cream with Tabasco Sauce and Atomic Fireballs on top, which would you choose?"

Ashley just stared.

"I thought so," said Leon triumphantly.

"Leon?" Ashley said quietly, "What's going to happen to us?"

"Well, we're probably going to die. But only after several more hours of fighting creatures, the likes of which are ridiculously dangerous and scary. And after I kill about five hundred more people. And I'll probably run into an old girlfriend, too."

Ashley blanched, "You really know how to comfort a girl, don't you?"

"Well, yeah," Leon said modestly, "Now. Let's go find some zombies!"

Outside the church/shed/Fifth Dimension, it was still raining. At the base of the cemetery hill stood about 480,988.247 villagers. Or maybe 30. Rough estimate. All of them carried torches, which mysteriously could withstand the buckets of rain pouring down from the sky.

"Shit," Leon said, checking his ammo, "I've only got two hundred packages of bullets. Not nearly enough…"

"Leon!" Ashley screeched, "Shoot the optimally placed barrels of explosive material!" She pointed vigorously at the optimally placed wagon filled with barrels labeled "Danger! Explosive material! Do not shoot in case of villager attack!" Leon, who hadn't gotten to use his gun for a while, gladly popped the barrels with a .45 mm fist to the face. If barrels had faces, that is.

The wagon exploded into a fiery pillar of death and destruction, rolled down the hill and, for sake of convenience, killed everyone around it. Leon and Ashley ran down the hill, into that one tunnel, past the (possibly) grinning Merchant, through the village, past several dozen bear traps (with Ashley managing to step in every single one), through the farm, through the doors that could only be opened with two people, and past another Merchant (this one with glowing red eyes, whom Leon shot on sight, mistaking him for a demon villager) to find themselves near a completely randomly placed two-story house.

As they neared the house, hoardes of villagers with torches (again apparently immune from the rain) closed in on them. Ashley screamed and began to hyperventilate. Leon backhanded her and shouted, "Pull it together, soldier!" He pointed at the house, "Come on," he cried, "Let's go trap ourselves in that house!" He made a mad dash for the house, nearly dislocating Ashley's shoulder as he dragged her behind.

Leon kicked the door open, shoved Ashley in and frantically looked for a way to bar the door. He considered shooting it, but something told him that wouldn't help at all.

"Leon!" said a familiar Spanish voice. Leon turned to see Luis Sera standing near the stairs holding up a two-by-four.

"AAA!" Leon screamed, "Don't hurt me!" He cowered near the wall, his arms over his head and his body shaking violently from fear.

"Uh, yeah," Luis said. He barred the door with the piece of wood and eyed Leon suspiciously, "You okay, _amigo_?"

"I think that may be my fault," Ashley said, raising her hand guiltily, "I kind of threw a piece of wood at him when I met him and apparently he has developed…a…phobia…why are you staring at me?"

"I see the president has equipped his daughter with ballistics, eh?" Luis chuckled, staring blatantly at Ashley's chest.

Ashley grinned and held her chin up, "You think they're nice? I think this sweater really makes them look…" She paused and thought about this. Suddenly, her features darkened dangerously. "You perv!" she cried, "How rude!" She picked up the nearest thing she could reach and chucked it at Luis. This object happened to be a box of tissues, which Leon caught easily and tossed it over his shoulder. "I hate you! What's your name anyway, you irritatingly perverted yet good-looking, dapper Spanish man?"

"Well, your Highness!" Luis mock-bowed to her, "Sticks and stones may break my bones, but names will never hurt me. Isn't that what you American-type people say? Speaking of names, perhaps you should tell me your name first?"

"Why should I?" Ashley crossed her arms and pouted.

"Because if you two don't stop arguing, I'll shoot you both," Leon said, waving his gun around recklessly, "Seriously. We've got kind of a problem."

"What's that?" Luis said, ignoring Ashley completely now, as she tried to protest Leon's irresponsible gunplay.

"Well, I forgot to mention that back on that bridge, Hunnigan called. And since I'm too lazy to go back and find a way to work it in, here's what she said," Leon explained as he scratched his head with the barrel of his gun, "Basically, we're all screwed."

"NOOOO…why?" Ashley asked.

"Umm, you know that helicopter that was supposed to come save our asses?"

"No," Luis and Ashley said at the same time.

"Oh. Well it got shot down. We're trapped here forever. Hunnigan said to keep going toward the extraction point. Just because apparently I've killed all the zombies in the way that we came and she doesn't want me to get bored."

"Or she wants to kill you, _amigo_," Luis said, "There's a huge-mongous castle that way where the enemies are stronger. Also some really short guy is over there with…"

"Yeah, yeah, yeah," Leon said, "Whatever, Louis..."

"Luis. It's pronounced 'Lu-ees', not 'Loo-is'."

"Whatever. Don't care, Louis. Right now, we've got to have this mega-monster showdown. Babycakes," he pointed at Ashley, who balled up her fists and growled at Leon, "Go upstairs and hide out for a while. Leave this to the big boys."

"How do you stand him?" Luis asked, narrowing his eyes at Leon.

"It's tough, believe me," Ashley said, "The name's Ashely, BTW."

"Luis."

The two shook hands and Ashley eyed him, "Hey, you single?"

"Uhh, yeah. Why?"

"You wanna get some coffee after this?"

Luis considered this. "Sure. Sounds good. Pick you up around…" he checked his watch, "Eight?"

"HELLO!" Leon shouted, "We've got a fleet of zombies approaching us at 10 o'clock, 4 o'clock, and 7 o'clock and you guys are talking about COFFEE? Babe. Get your ass up those stairs!"

"I hope a zombie eats your face," Ashley muttered as she trudged up the stairs. Luis reloaded his little six-bullet revolver and cocked the gun. "It's showtime."

Within five minutes of the first attack of zombies, Leon got attacked 40 times, had used 196 bullets, and killed a total of 3 zombies. Luis blasted away with his wicked-powerful gun and even though Leon actually shot him several times, he was able to withstand the blows and keep on truckin'. At some point, they were forced to run upstairs and kill some more zombies. Somehow, they managed to kill the required maximum number of casualties the Spanish villagers were willing to take and, even though if the villagers had chosen to hold out for even a few more minutes, they would have succeeded, they instead chose to pull back and let their prey live on to see another day. Go figure.

"Whew!" Leon said, wiping his forehead with his loaded gun, "That was intense!"

"What are you talking about?" Luis raised an eyebrow dubiously, "You didn't do anything. You ran around and picked up items."

"That's not true!"

"No, you're right," Luis said, thinking, "You threw a flash grenade at some point. Oh, and SHOT ME IN THE HEAD!"

"You baby," Leon scoffed, "You're fine. Just walk it off." He tossed his hair in a manly way and stared out the window, "Well, we better keep going toward our certain doom, eh Christie?"

"Ashley," Ashley corrected, "Whatever. I guess I'll come with. You are hot, after all and I've got nothing better to do. See you later, Luis?"

"Yeah, I gotta go," Luis said, "I can't tell you why, except that I'll see you again next chapter and if you read the notes that I 'accidentally' left lying around, it'll all start to make sense. Unless you're Leon."

"What?"

"Nothing. Bye!" Luis snapped his fingers and vanished in a puff of smoke.

"Cool," Ashley whispered in awe.

"Ah, that's nothing," Leon said, "I can do that."

"Really?"

"No. Let's go."

* * *

_A/N: Thank you all for all your awesome reviews and...um...readings! Words cannot describe how happy it makes me to know that people are reading and enjoying my stuff! Coming up next: the end of the village! I dunno which way to have Leon and Ashley go through that double-path thing... Any ideas? Which is the preferred side?  
Please be reminded: I do not own Resident Evil 4, Star Wars, Rubik's Cube, nor anything else I mentioned in this chapter or any others. Merci beaucoup!_  



	8. Ch 7: Divergent Centipede Boundaries

The barren lot around the dilapidated two-story house was quiet and devoid of all life, save a creepy-looking, armed-to-the-teeth hooded man and a murder of crows. Yeah, that's right. Murder. Look it up. The crows landed on the muddy ground, thankful for the let-up in the rain, and they began pecking at the dirt.

Suddenly, someone let out a Tarzan-esque battle cry and a blonde American man sailed out of a window on the second floor. He executed a graceful pirouette and somersault in mid-air and landed flat on his face in the mud with a loud "squelch".

A girl dressed in pre-skanky Britney Spears garb ran out the front door of the house and stood next to the blonde man. "I told you it was a stupid idea," she said haughtily, "You may be gorgeous, but when it comes to brains, you're one… you're not the brightest…um, uh…you're kind of stupid."

"Shut up and get me a first-aid spray," Leon muttered through the mud.

Exactly four minutes and eighteen seconds later, Leon was back on his feet and striding as quickly as he could toward a contraption consisting of two gates and a lever in between. Ashley jogged along behind, her uggs getting stuck in the mud and slowing her progress.

Leon stopped in front of the lever. Little white letters appeared in the air, hovering at about knee-height. Leon and Ashley stared mystified at the letters.

"What does it mean?" Ashley whispered.

"What does it say?" Leon said in an equally hushed tone.

Ashley glanced at Leon and rolled her eyes. She pulled a pair of rhinestone-studded cat's eye glasses from her secret hidden purse. Leon snickered and Ashley kicked him in the shins. As Leon writhed in pain, Ashley cleared her throat and began to read.

"Hello, Doomed Americans! I hope you both are well, aside from the fact that sometime soon, your heads will explode and you both will become my minions. Here is the deal with this thing: past the left gate lies an ungodly amount of villagers; beyond the right is a Lord of the Rings troll, I mean, El Gigante. Whichever you choose, you'll probably die. So choose well! Hahahaha! Right. So, have a good day!"

"So which way do we choose?" Ashley asked as she put her glasses away, "And what do they mean by Lord of the Rings troll?"

"Right, but what about that hill over there?"

"…What the hell are you talking about?"

"Here's the plan, Marissa…"

"Ashley."

"Whatever!" Leon glared fiercely at her, "That's what I said. Now, are you going to listen to the plan?"

"If it's like everything else you do, I probably want nothing to do with…"

"It's follow the plan or I shoot you in the face. Your choice."

Ashley shut her mouth and listened intently.

"Okay. So no point in us missing a single zombie, so we're going to split up."

"What?"

"You take the troll, I'll take the villagers. Got it? Good. Ready?" Lon put one hand out and waited for Ashley to complete the football huddle. She just stared in disbelief.

"Come on," Leon urged, grabbing her hand, "It's for luck! One, two, three, Leon rocks!"

"Are you crazy?" Ashley whined, yanking her hand away, "I can't fight anything! The only weapon I have is the can of mace on my keychain!" She curled up in a fetal position and began rocking back and forth, muttering, "I would have been better off in that church…"

Leon sighed, "Okay, Admiral Bitch-and-Moan-All-the-Time, I'll give you one of my guns."

Ashley brightened at the prospect of heavy munitions, "Can I have the shotgun?"

"No," Leon said shortly, "You can have…um…" He considered his arsenal, not wanting to give anything of remote value away to anyone. Finally, he got it. "Here," he said, handing Ashley the rifle scope, "You can have this." He clapped his hands to indicate that debate was over and took off down the left gateway, leaving Ashley behind.

It was quiet down the left path. Too quiet. Leon cocked his gun and narrowed his eyes at the empty camp area. The only thoughts in his head where about how much he wanted to shoot something and how cold he was, now that his jacket was gone. He shed a brief tear for his MIA jacket and continued on.

Suddenly, the villagers attacked. The came one by one, as according to the roles of the Minions of Hostile World Takeovers Union. Leon, who was getting quite good at killing things, was able to pick off the villagers using only one and a half clips each. "All those years in 'Nam sure paid off," he drawled, sauntering like John Wayne, "Damn Commies're takin' over everythin'!" Then it occurred to him that John Wayne was never in any movies about Vietnam and that it was chronologically impossible for him (Leon) to have been in the Vietnam War. This was also when Leon chose to jump down into an obviously ominous clearing-ish area in the camp.

Immediately upon landing on the ground, there was the awful gut-wrenching noise of a chainsaw and two chainsaw-wielding people, followed by a small fleet of villagers, burst through the solid concrete (or wood) that they were hiding behind. Ordinarily, Leon would have screamed like a little girl and ran as fast as he could toward whatever exit and/or hole in the ground he could find. But these Chainsaw People were no ordinary Chainsaw people. These were Chainsaw Ladies.

"Well, hello, ladies," Leon said in a voice as oily as a car axle, "Nice pants. Can I talk you out of them?"

The Chainsaw Ladies stopped stalking toward Leon and just gaped at Leon. Well, we assume they were gaping. One wonders how they could see through the blood-soaked rags wrapped around their heads and faces. One also wonders if blood-soaked head/face turbans are the latest fashion from Paris.

So the Chainsaw Ladies, whose names were Rosa and Maria Bella, just gaped. "Are you talking to us?" Rosa, the one with the key around her neck said in perfect English.

"Uh, yeah," Leon said warily, "You two aren't madly in love with me? Usually that line works… I don't understand…"

"We are not wearing pants, for one thing," Maria said matter-of-factly, "And we are deranged Spanish villagers. Those silly mind games don't work on us."

"But Maria," Rosa said, "He's kind of cute. You don't think we can just…y'know, keep him?"

Leon grinned. Finally! A woman, besides that blonde chick…Amy? Seemed remotely interested in him! He tossed his hair manfully, "That's right, ladies. I'm here; the answer to your prayers!"

"Prayers!" one of the crazy villagers who had appeared with the Bella Sisters exclaimed excitedly, "Oh, boy! Time to pray!" He said this in Spanish and then made a mad dash for the exit, which happened to be directly behind Leon.

"OMFG Zombie!" Leon cried and his hand dove for his guns. But before Leon could blast the overexcited villager to kingdom come, the guy dashed past the Bella Sisters. Or tried to.

"Stay back!" Maria shouted, holding out a preventative arm, "I want to talk to this punk!" Unfortunately, the villager ran into the purring chainsaw rather than Maria's arm.

"Kind of yuck," Rosa muttered, "Guess that's why the game is rated M." She picked a piece of overexcited villager off her shoulder and presumably batted her eyes at Leon.

"Yeah, well," Maria said, "That's the first nasty part in this story, so I think we're doing pretty well on the gore aspect." She probably glared at her sister, "Will you stop fawning like a giggling idiot over him?"

"Game? Story?" Leon sputtered, "What are you two talking about? Look, I don't date crazy dames, so…"

"Crazy, are we?" Maria growled, brandishing her chainsaw.

"Hey! Well, when I said 'crazy', I meant…uh…I meant it in a good way!"

"Oh, Maria, can't we just let him go?" Rosa sighed, "I don't have the energy to saw his head off right now…"

"Well don't blame me if Saddler pitchforks our faces to a wall," Maria replied, "But if you want to end up like Carmelita…"

"Oh, that was your sister?" Leon asked, remembering the girl in the shed from way back in the first chapter, "She was pretty hot."

The Bella Sisters just stared blankly at Leon. "Yeah," Maria said finally, "Whatever, cowboy. Rosa, give him the key. I hear there's a sale at the mall on bloodstained earth-tone colored clothes, anyway."

"Ooh!" Rosa clapped her hands, "I can't wait!" She tossed Leon the key and gave him a pathetic glance, "Such a waste! 'Bye, cute _Americano_!" Then she and her sister revved their chainsaws, cut themselves new exits in the camp walls and were gone.

"Damn!" Leon said, "I didn't even get their numbers."

"Leon managed to find his way downt he path, past some ominous barbed wire, through a relatively stupid herd of villagers (then again, were these guys ever that intelligent to begin with?) and into some weird ledge area alongside a ginormous ravine. There, leaning on some nearby barrels, was Ashley, talking on her cell phone and filing her nails.

"Well, you know, Brett," she said into her phone, "I would love to go to a movie with you tonight. Unfortunately, I am out of the country right now…No, I'm serious. …Of course I'm not lying to you! …Well, Becky is a bitch; what did you expect from her? …Where am I? Uhh, honestly? …I'm in some crazy Spanish cult where I was brought after they kidnapped me and now they injected me with some bloodthirsty parasite which will probably kill me and destroy the world. Or at least the United States. …Aww, that's so sweet, Brett! …Sure, we can go out when I get back. If I'm not dead, of course. …Haha! Oh, Brett! You're terrible! …Yeah, I'm taking Calc next semester, but I'm…Oh. It's you," Ashley sneered at Leon, "Listen, Brett. I gotta go. …Yeah, another man. …No, he's hotter than you, but he's also dumb as a stump. …Haha, yeah. 'Bye." Ashley hung up her phone and glared wordlessly at Leon.

"Okay, first of all, I don't appreciate that kind of talk," Leon said, "I like to think I'm smarter than a tree stump. Second, how did you get here before me?"

"When Fred…"

"Who's Fred?"

"The Gigante. When Fred tried to attack me, I cried," Ashley said scathingly, as if this should be painfully obvious, "I told him what a jerkwad you are and he felt bad for me. So he gave me 500 million pesetas and let me go. What took _you_ so long?"

"500 million pesetas, eh?" Leon ignored her question, "Maybe you should leave that with me for safekeeping…"

"No way," Ashley retorted, "Touch my money and I'll kick you until you're dead. I'm saving it for makeup."

"Yeah, you do that. You need all the makeup you can get…Ouch!"

"So are you going to answer my question?"

"I met some girls," Leon said, "They were way sexier than you, even with…uh… they were sexier than you. In fact, I wish you had died. Then I could go date one of the ladies."

"Leon!" Ashley wailed, "Tell me they weren't sexier than me! Don't you know I love you? You must love me! Tell me you love me! I can't bear to go on if you don't love me!"

"Uh…"

"Brett! Pfh! Brett means nothing to me! I promise, Leon! You are the only man for me!"

"But they had chainsaws…"

"Damn!" Ashley muttered, "That'll be tough to beat… Note to self: get a large power tool. Ooh! Preferably something along the lines of a router or a radial arm saw…" She grinned broadly, "Okay! Let's go!"

Leon shrugged and headed up the path. This kind of thing happened to him all the time.

Ashley watched him go and grinned deviously, "All is going according to plan," she cackled, "Soon, he will be unable to resist my amazing power tool sexiness!"

The twisting paths led up to a large set of double doors with a wonky gold mask on it, to a chairlift setup off to one side, and to the Merchant, but Leon was still too poor to buy anything from him, so we're going to ignore him for now.

"What do you think this thing is?" Leon said as he poked around the mask thingy on the door, "Think it's like a…GAH!" Leon stumbled backward, clutching at his face, "That laser got me in the eye! Oh, God! I'm blind!"

"That's retinal scanner," Ashley explained slowly, so as not to confuse Leon, "IT reads the patterns of your eye. You can't be blind. The scanning light isn't dangerous."

"Oh." Leon pulled his hands back and blinked, "I can see! It's a miracle!"

"So how do we get in?" Ashley said.

"Wait…" Leon said suddenly, "I'm remembering something…"

"_Alright, you sissy boys," Coach Reynolds shouted in a Stereotypical Football Coach Voice ™, "Y'all are trying out for the varsity football team! First up, Kennedy! Git your fanny out on that field!"_

_Seventeen-year-old Leon jumped up from the cold metal bench and pulled on his helmet. He really hoped that he didn't make a fool of himself during the tryouts. In everything else he'd try to do during high school, he'd managed to severely embarrass himself. _

"_All right," Coach Reynolds yelled from the sidelines, "Go ahead, boys!"_

_Before Leon knew what was happening, there were a dozen guys the size of bulldozers running straight for him. He started to let out a girly scream, but caught himself and began to run as fast as he could toward the goalposts._

_Leon felt someone grab him, but he managed to wiggle out of the linebacker's grasp. He ran as fast as he could and before he knew it, he was past the touchdown line and doing his victory dance. But for some reason, everyone was laughing._

"_Haw!" Burly Jim Johnson guffawed, "Kennedy's got no pants on!"_

_Leon looked down and turned a bright shade of red. It was true; his pants had been pulled off in the attempted tackle and now the entire football team could see his Care Bear boxers. _

_But it got worse. The entire school of 3,000 students had turned out to watch the football team tryouts and every single student and teacher in the school was now standing on the bleachers, pointing and laughing at Leon. Leon looked up at the newly installed Jumbotron and he saw his boxers on the big ol' LCD screen, or whatever it is that those things have. _

"_Aw, man," Leon said, "Guess that means I have to move again…"_

"Too far back," present-day Leon muttered, "Wait…" Ashley eyed Leon nervously and edged away slowly.

_Just then, a big Spanish man walked into the room. And I mean big. This guy was, like, twenty feet tall and must have weighed the same as a small European car. Which is convenient should anyone care to test this estimation, because guess what! They're in Europe! _

_No, actually, the guy was more like 6 and a half, 7 feet tall. But that's still pretty damn big. He also looked like he was wearing shoulder pads underneath his camouflage trench coat (so called because it was gasp! gray). He eyed the pair of men with his one good eye, the other being an obvious glass eye (KEY POINT!)._

"That's it!" Leon flung his arms wide in triumph, whacking Ashley in the face in the process. She groaned and fell to the ground as Leon continued, "We've got to go find the Chief and steal his fake eyeball! Let's go!" Unholstering his gun, he set off for the nearby chairlift because there was nowhere else to go.

Ashley, being unconscious, stayed crumpled in a heap on the ground.

"Damn, those villagers have good aim," Leon exclaimed appreciatively as he stepped off the chairlift on the other side of the ravine. He pulled two pitchforks, four knives, three sickles, and a medium-sized combine out of/off his skin/body. "And they must have a Farm and Fleet around here with this kind of unlimited supply of sharp farming implements. Ashley! You okay?"

Leon interpreted the silence as confirmation.

"Great!" he said, "Let's go!"

Below the chairlift, the path forked into two separate ways. Down one path was a sacrificial altar, which would be a great place for Leon to act like a moron yet again. Sadly, this chapter is already too long. So, Leon didn't even see the path because I COMMANDED IT BE SO! MOO HA HA! Instead, he continued down Path #2 until he came upon a shed.

"Stay here, Ashley," Leon whispered, "This could be dangerous." And then, because Leon is stupid, he cautiously pushed open the door to the shed, completely disregarding Horror Genre Rule #1: When you find somewhere that's scary and dark, always run in with guns blazing and without any regard for potential danger.

"Uh, hello?" Leon shouted to the cobwebby barrels of explosive material, "Is anyone here? I'm trying to give away my element of surprise, so if you're here, feel free to attack me!"

"With pleasure, _Americano_," Bitorez 'Big Cheese' Mendez said maliciously as he used his superhuman strength to heave a Mack truck at Leon.

Leon cleverly dodged the truck, which I…er, we as authors don't believe is actually possible. "Well, well, well," Leon sneered, "If it isn't Bit-URK!" Mendez grabbed Leon's neck and lifted the blonde American off the ground.

"Do you have any idea how annoying you are?" Mendez growled, "My desk is packed to next Sunday with incident reports that you have caused. Now I am going to kill you." He dropped Leon to the ground because strangulation is far too easy a death for one who has caused mountains of paperwork for another person.

Leon ducked out of Mendez's reach and ran over to one corner. "Not if I have anything to say about it," he replied, "Hasta la vista, baby!" And in his infinite wisdom, Leon shot the nearest barrel of explosive material and the shed was engulfed in flames, save for a conveniently clear area just wide enough for a boss battle.

Mendez decided now was the time to deploy his secret weapon and so as his coat burned off, Upper Mendez split from Lower Mendez in some semblance of a divergent plate boundary. Only instead of magma and basalt rock in between, there was a giant centipede body.

"Well, that can't be normal," Leon observed, "Do you always turn into a giant centipede or am I just lucky?" Then, realizing he was essentially hitting on a giant centipede-man, Leon emptied several rounds of shotgun bullets into Mendez until Lower Mendez detached itself and ran away.

"Damn!" Mendez cursed, "There goes my wallet and car keys! I'll get you for this, you…"

Mendez couldn't finish the rest of his sentence because at that moment, Leon reloaded his gun and pulled the trigger 17.824 times. As the smoke and tumbleweeds cleared, Sheriff Leon saw the corpse of Black Bart Bitorez 'Big Cheese' Mendez lying dead on the ground.

"On the bright side," Leon said, "now he won't have to live life as a centipede man." In what might be one of the grossest not-violently cool moments of the game, Leon picked up Mendez's eye-juice drenched fake eye and held it about two inches from his face.

Me: EEEEEEEEEW! IT'S DRIPPING, MATT!

Matt (my brother): Will you go already, you moron? I want to play Burnout sometime this century.

Leon: What game! This is real life!

After pocketing the DRIPPING eyeball, Leon found Lower Mendez and stole the chief's 11,000 pesetas and his keychain, which turned out to be for a lame Grand Am. Sighing in disappointment, Leon shot a hole through the wall of the shed and walked back out into the night.

Retreating back up the slope and across the chairlift, Leon was suddenly attracted to Ashley. He found her silence extremely appealing and on the way back, he had a deep, very personal conversation with her, which consisted of Leon telling his life story in excruciating detail.

"So that's what happened in the fourth grade," Leon was saying as he stepped off the chairlift, "You know, Ashley, you're very easy to talk to. I feel like I could tell you…Hey!"

As he neared the double doors, Leon saw Ashley and a villager with a Plaga-parasite head sitting on the ground playing cards. "Gin!" Ashley cried triumphantly as Leon came over the ridge. "Hey, stranger!" she waved to Leon. The villager looked up, or made the motions of looking, as his head had been replaced with one of the wiggly parasites and waved jovially.

"What is going on here!" Leon said incredulously, wildly gesturing to the cards and the villager.

Ashley and the villager looked at each other, shrugged and put the cards away. Then they stood up and Ashley began to scream and run in circles while the villager lumbered after her, wiggling menacingly.

"OMFG!" Leon cried, "I'll save you, Ashley!" Leon eliminated the villager and struck a heroic pose, "Thank God I saved you! Here, hold this for a sec." He handed Ashley the STILL DRIPPING (God, how much eye juice is in a person's eye socket!) eye. She shrieked and dropped the eye on the ground.

"What the heck is that?" Ashley whined, staring at the eyeball as if it might eat her face at any moment.

"It's just an eyeball," Leon rolled his eyes as Ashley cringed, "Get over yourself. Geez." He picked up the eyeball and held it in the path of the Light of Death and Blindness. The door clicked open and (to the author's consternation) Leon tossed the eyeball over the ledge.

On the other side of the gate, Leon and Ashley could see the silhouette of a large castle. "Ooh!" Leon jumped up and down excitedly, "It's the castle! The castle!"

"Leon!" Ashley cried, "Watch out!" She pointed to a truck that was hurdling down the path, honking its horn wildly, just so anyone in the path could be sure they were about to be run over by a big ol' truck.

"OMGWTFBIGTRUCK!" Leon and Ashley screamed in unison. Leon tossed Ashley his shotgun and still screaming their brains out, both emptied their guns into the truck. Finally, the truck flipped over and exploded four feet in front of the pair.

"We did it!" Ashley cheered, a whiny quality to her voice, "Hey!"

Leon snatched the shotgun away from Ashley and gave her a cold stare. "Do not touch my guns," he commanded icily.

"But you gave it…"

"Don't talk back!" Leon slapped Ashley and she squealed. "Now, let's go." Leon said. They walked up the path and across the drawbridge into the castle.

"Shouldn't we stay out there?" Ashley pointed back outside the castle, "That's where the helicopter is supposed to pick us up, right?"

"What does this button do?" Leon ignored Ashley's stupid question and ogled a big red button that said, "Drawbridge Button – Bridge Will Self-Destruct Upon Pressing This Button." Leon pressed the button and the bridge exploded into a brilliant green mushroom cloud. Why green? Because I can.

"OMG!" Ashley wailed, "Now I'm going to die of radiation poisoning, too!"

"Ooh!" Leon said, "Pretty colors!

"Well," he continued, "Can't go back; let's go in!" The walkie-talkie crackled and Leon held it up, "Hey, Hunnigan, sweetie! What's shakin'?"

"Where are you two?" Hunnigan asked tersely, "It's been at least one chapter since you've reported in! The president is about ready to eat me alive because I don't know where the hell you are!"

"We're in Cinderella's castle! Aren't you excited, Hunnigan?"

"What on God's green earth are you talking about? Look, there's a big castle near the extraction point…"

"Yeah, that's where we are!"

"Oh, shit."

Ashley snatched the walkie-talkie away, "What do you mean, 'Oh, shit'?"

"That castle belongs to the Los Illuminados."

"Oh, fuckin' hell," Ashley cursed. Leon gave her an incredulous and slightly impressed look. "Hmm, I'm even more attracted to this whiny little girl when she swears," Leon thought silently as they walked into Cindrella's Spanish Castle of Doom.

_A/N: Guys! Sorry for the length of this chapter! The thing just wouldn't end! Random thoughts: I was so mad that you don't get to keep the eyeball when you're done with it! How cool would that have been to have an eyeball in your inventory?_

_Thanks for your reviews!_


	9. Ch 8: Wait, You're Speaking English?

_A/N: (dance techno beat) Everybody! Ye-eah... Rock your bod-day! Ye-eah... Everybody rock your body right. Runny Eggs 4 has a new chapter! All right! Yep, iz the next installment. Enjoy and thanks for waiting, those who continue to read!  
_

**Chapter The Next One: Wait, You're Speaking English?**_  
_

_Omnipotent Voice of Doom: Hi, all! It's been a while, hasn't it, my good friends and family. Or just friends. Or vague acquaintances. Yeah. Whatever. I apologize for that. I was going through detox…I mean, taking a vacation. Yeah, that's it. So…hang on, let me find my place in my script here… Hey! This isn't my script! This is the owner's manual for my microwave! Oh, fuck it, I'm just going to wing it. Don't you wave at me! We already went over this; I will do as I damn well please! Wait…what are you doing? Hey, don't cut the mike…_

_Am I back on? Right. Okay, stick to the script, I get it. Okay, so here we go. Contrary to Leon's quest, I hear Spain is actually quite a nice place to visit. The odds are that most of the people are not half-crazed, parasite-infested bloodthirsty villagers; the scenery is probably not all completely composed of five hundred different shades of gray; and the country is rich with history and culturally important buildings. Like the Death Castle of the Los Illuminados._

"I bet this castle is rich with history and is a very culturally important building!" Leon exclaimed in a hushed voice as he and Ashley wandered around the courtyard, breaking open boxes in the hopes that they would not contain snakes and/or severed heads. "I mean it's all, like, old and shit. That means it's gotta be important, right?"

"Leon, I really don't care," Ashley whined in a voice that was (amazingly) more whiny than usual. I know, you didn't think it was possible, right? Well, guess what. It was. Anyway, so Ashley said, "There are totally way too many spider webs around here for me to feel safe." She cringed as another spider web jumped out from its hiding place in the shadows behind the merchant's love shack…er, shack.

"You know what your problem is, Stacey?" Leon said as he ferociously knifed his way through another balsa wood box, which contained a very flustered chicken, "You just need to lighten up. You know, be a man!" He slapped Ashley hard on the back in a genial male-type bonding gesture. Ashley stumbled forward from the weight of the slap and she shrieked in a whiny manner as she collided face-first with a particularly large and malicious pile of spider webs.

As Ashley attempted to pull herself out of the sticky mess and simultaneously avoid the spiders the size of Volkswagen Beetles (the old ones) that were now stalking her with the intensity of Bengal tigers on the hunt, Leon ignored her squeals for help and drifted over to the merchant's heavy arsenal and car air freshener display.

"Hey, Tiffany!" Leon bounced back over to the cobweb covered Ashley, his arms piled high with bandoliers of bullets and lilac-scented air fresheners, "You want a car freshener? I got four different kinds! And they were five for a dollar, so you can have the burnt marshmallow one I got for free."

He watched as Ashley hauled herself to her feet, her entire body hidden in the cobwebs. Her one visible eye glared at Leon through the Saran wrap-esque webs. "For the eleventy-millionth time, my name is Ashley. Look, I'm going to ask you for one thing and one thing only, Leon. Can you just get me out of this country as quickly as possible without getting me killed? That's all I want. That and a new Porsche, but I think Daddy may be giving me one for Christmas, so you don't need to worry about that."

"Sorry, babe! Can't hear you!" Leon shouted, waving jauntily from the staircase as he frolicked into the castle proper. Ashley sighed and shook her head, "Guess I'm on my own here. Until I get kidnapped by parasite-controlled monster zombie people, that is." She picked up one of the air fresheners that Leon had dropped, put it around her neck and bounced off after Leon.

"I gotta say, Leon," Ashley said, her mood considerably improved, "I think there's something about these air fresheners. I think they have some kind of protective force field or something. I feel totally safe!"

Leon rolled his eyes in disgust. They were walking along some narrow path that skirted the castle and his mood was steadily falling. There had been no boxes to break in a while, no bad guys to shoot, and to his frustration, he was actually starting to give a crap about the girl who was following him like a lost puppy. Why was she following him again? As he tried desperately to remember, he heard something that chilled his blood. "Shhh!" he hissed at Ashley and he cocked his gun, ready to attack.

"Because the air fresheners in my car are nothing like these. When I let Linebacker Biff borrow my car that once for our date, I was sure I was gonna die. But maybe if I had one of these in it…"

"Shut up!"

"Y'know, their, like, force field would protect me on those scary dates. Speaking of scary dates, there was that one time when I went out with Morris from the Chess Club. It was more of a pity thing, honestly, but he was cute when he took his glasses off. But really…"

BLAM!

Ashley stopped speaking immediately, her eyes wide in terror. Her air freshener lay in smoking pieces on the ground, the little stretchy white string still around her neck. Leon blew the smoke out of the barrel of his gun and glared at Ashley. "Now. D'you hear that?"

They both listened. Ashley immediately started screaming and Leon only was able to shut her up by pulling his gun out again and threatening to shoot another air freshener. The sound they both heard sounded like chanting, specially engineered chanting designed to make anyone who heard it wet their pants.

"Or skirt," Ashley whispered, "Leon, I'm scared! Can we just go?"

"And miss a chance to attack some zombie men?" Leon grinned maliciously, "Hell, no!" He reloaded his gun, twirled it deftly around his finger until it flew off and landed on the ground a few yards away, firing as it hit the ground. "Oh, crap," Leon muttered as he saw a whole bunch of figures up ahead moving toward them.

"Leon!" Ashley shrieked, "Do something!"

The world froze around Leon as he tried to think of a solution to the jam that they were now in. His mind raced frantically, or as frantically as it could as he did his best to ignore the shiny, distracting bricks and dirt clods all around him. Then an idea began to formulate in his mind. Just as it became clear, a big giant ball of fire landed on Leon's head.

"!&)!#)$&)&$!#&#$&#$(!(!&!($!#&$!#$&!($&!&$)&)!()!#&(&(&#)!" Leon said. Ashley stared at him, mouth open in surprise. The heads of the Illuminados dudes that were running toward the pair suddenly exploded due to severe swearing overload and the Plagas inside them ran away, screaming and clutching the places on their heads where there would/should have been ears.

"What was that!" Leon exclaimed, oblivious to the goings-on around him, "Was that a giant fireball!"

"I think so," Ashley said, gradually recovering from her shock.

Leon considered this for a moment. "Well, okay." Leon shrugged his shoulders and took off running toward the fireballs, "Last one there is a dyslexic ferret!"

After dodging several dozen more fireballs and shooting a big ol' cannon at the giant front door of the castle, Leon and Ashley finally found themselves past the Catapult Gauntlet of Doom. "Who _does_ that!" Leon shouted at the balls of fire that were still raining down from the sky, "What kind of a welcoming committee is this? It's almost like they don't want us here!"

"Aye, amigo," said a dapper Spanish voice from behind them, "They don't."

Leon and Ashley turned to find themselves face to face with Luis Sera. "ZOMBIE!" Leon cried and pointed his gun at Luis. Luis just rolled his eyes, "Look, you guys. I brought you some pills." He tossed Leon a little orange prescription bottle of pills and Leon eyed them warily.

"Look, Luis," Leon said, "I appreciate the thought, but I don't do that kind of stuff. Really, I just got off drugs a few months ago… Unless this is LSD. Please say it's LSD!"

"Uh…no," Luis said, "It's to stop the Plagas inside you from growing big enough to rip your head off and control your body. Look, you've been coughing up blood, right?"

"Well, sure, but isn't that normal?" Leon replied. Luis and Ashley gave him weird looks and edged away slowly.

"That means the Plagas are hatching," Luis said, "And you've only got about twenty minutes to live." Ashley's face went deathly pale and she let out a little gasp. Leon wasn't even listening; he was watching the pretty birds.

"Twenty minutes…" Ashley said softly, "But I don't…but…"

"Nah, I was just messing with you," Luis laughed, "You should have seen your face! But seriously. It's not good. It means I have to disappear mysteriously again without telling you where I'm going."

"Wait!" Ashley said, "Take me with you!"

"No, no," Luis said overdramatically, "I cannot! Stay with Leon! He's…um… better with the…ladies? Or something?"

Leon grinned broadly and did a victory move, "Ho, yeah!"

"And he has several guns. I only have one, after all. You will be safer with him, my dear Ashley!"

Ashley considered this, "Yeah, but at least you're sane."

"Don't tempt me!" Luis said flamboyantly, "I cannot protect you! You will be safer here! Farewell, Ashley! I will not forget you!" And with that, he ran toward the edge of the castle and dove off the balcony. After a few seconds, he shot back up, his parachute having been deployed. He tossed a red rose down to Ashley and sailed off into the night while playing a romantic song on a violin.

"He's so dreamy," Ashley smiled at Luis's fading figure, "Leon, why aren't you like that?"

"Because…I have this!" Leon whipped out his rifle, advanced the bullets and picked off a crow from fifty paces. "Booyah!" he shouted as he did an elaborate victory move, which involved much moonwalking and was vaguely reminiscent of a Michael Jackson dance. "Whatcha think of that, Susie Q?"

Ashely rolled her eyes, "Whatever. Can we just go?"

Leon nodded, "Sure. Just let me do some things." He took out a grenade, fiddled around with the wires and then pulled the pin and tossed it in some random direction. The grenade exploded and the air was rent with the dying groans of several dozen Illuminados cult members. "Okay," Leon said, "Now we can go."

"How did you do that?" Ashley said in awe.

"I didn't," Leon rolled his eyes as if to say _duh_, "The author did."

"But…"

"Shut up!" I said from my chair in front of my computer, "Don't question my authority, small person!"

Ashley gazed up in fear at the sky, "Where did that voice come from?"

Leon sighed and rolled his eyes again, "Come on, stupid. Let's go wander around in a vaguely Spanish and creepy creature-infested castle for another ten hours or so before it's time to wander around on a scary mad scientist's island for another ten hours."

As the pair moved into the foyer of the castle, Leon's walkie-talkie magic cell phone thing-a-ma-jigger's ring tone went off. Ashley dubiously raised one eyebrow. "Your ring tone is Spice Girls 'Wannabe'?"

"No!" Leon said defensively.

"Yes, it is. It just went off."

"Shut up! You didn't hear anything! What is it, Hunnigan!"

"Well, well," Hunnigan said dryly, "Someone's in a bad mood. I guess it's better than some half-ass pickup line."

"Well, if you want one…"

"Please. No."

"Ms. Hunnigan," Ashley snatched the walkie-talkie away, "Please tell me what's going on. I'm really scared." She continued whining indistinctly into the walkie-talkie.

Leon glared angrily at Ashley and ripped the walkie-talkie out of her hands, "Don't touch my phone, wench!" He cleared his throat and puffed his chest out in a manly way, reminiscent of a male pigeon, "What's going on, Hunnigan?"

"I ordered another helicopter and it should be there now," Hunnigan said, "But since you morons went into the Castle of Doom, I guess you're gonna die. No big loss, I guess, right?"

"Way to inspire confidence, sweet-cheeks."

"I try, you pervert."

"So what would you like us to do?" Leon rolled his eyes in a condescending manner, "I mean, I can take care of myself and I don't really care if What's-Her-Face dies at the hands of evil bloodthirsty zombie-men, but you know… We could lose our jobs here."

"True," Hunnigan said, pondering the situation. Ashley just stared, mouth open in disbelief, "I'm too old at this point to find a new job, so I guess we gotta save the stupid girl."

"Hunnigan! I thought you were on my side!"

Hunnigan ignored Ashley and continued, "Listen, Leon. I have an idea that will save you about fifteen hours of gameplay here. I want you to…" Hunnigan's voice was suddenly cut off by static as Leon ferociously turned the dial to another station.

"What did you do that for?" Ashley whined, "Now we're never going to get out of here! We're going to be eaten by zombie men and I'll never get to buy that skirt I saw at Saks last week!"

Leon ignored her and he fiddled with the knobs on the walkie-talkie, "Quiet. I think I can get the game on this." He pressed a button and the voice of a baseball announcer came perfectly clearly over the radio. Leon and Ashley sat down on the ground and listened to the rest of the baseball game. All the while they sat on the floor, munching on miraculously produced bags of popcorn and cotton candy, a ridiculous giggling echoed throughout the hall, almost like that of a crazy psychopath midget flanked by praying mantis-esque lackeys.

"What is that?" Ashley, ever the Captain Obvious, whined after about an hour of the inane giggling.

Leon looked at his watch, "Well, judging by my Mission Clock-O-Meter, it's about time to meet another bad guy. And my pizza delivery man instincts tell me that he's…" Leon sniffed the air, narrowed his eyes, and pointed down the corridor, "That way."

"I hope he's hot," Ashley mused quietly as they moved toward the cut scene, "And if his IQ is higher than that of mayonnaise, that'd definitely be a bonus."

"Unfortunately, I don't think you're going to be that lucky on either option," Leon whispered to Ashley as a little man who looked like a Mini-Me, George Washington Edition appeared on the balcony above the walkway

"Welcome to my castle, Meester Kennedy," said the midget in a vaguely threatening manner, "I hope you are feeling welcome here."

"Uh, yeah, about that…"

"Look, Mr. Short Man," Ashley interrupted Leon in mid-sentence, "Can you tell us how to get out of here?" Leon glared ferociously at Ashley and fingered his gun menacingly.

"Don't you want to know if I'm single?" said the midget, "I am, by the way. Plus I am Spanish. I know you American girls are turned on by sexy foreign accents. So, how about it, little girl?"

Ashley just stared blankly at the midget.

"Look, Shorty," said Leon impatiently, "All we want is to shoot more possessed zombie people in the head and get enough money to buy the rocket launcher. Can you help us with that?"

"The problem with that request," said the midget, "Is that you are not worth an outdated Spanish peseta to us, Meester Scott Kennedy. So you should just either leave the country and/or die. Whichever suits you better. So how about this, Meester Scott…"

"Why are you calling me by my middle name?"

"HOW ABOUT THIS, MEESTER SCOTT! You can just wait right there and I can send my Caped Crusader monks down after you, mmkay?"

"Yeah, but…"

"OKAY!" The midget twitched angrily, "LET'S JUST DO WHAT I WANT, MMKAY!" He gestured to the two bipedal praying mantises standing on either side of him, "Zorftor, Maxiltron, let's leave Mr. Scott Kennedy to his death."

"What about me?" Ashley shouted at the midget, "Doesn't my death matter to you?"

"Who are you?" said the midget.

"I'm Ashley Graham, the daughter to the president of the United States."

"The whoozit-whatsit?"

"You kidnapped me."

The midget shook his head, "Nope. Doesn't ring a bell. But if you're so interested in dying, okay." He turned to his lackeys, "Kill her, too."

"Hey!" Ashley wailed, "I don't want to die!"

"Well, then maybe you should be careful what you ask for," said the midget as he turned to leave. Suddenly, he turned around and looked back at the pair below him. "Oh, yeah, I bet you're wondering who I am."

"Not really," said Leon, who was already itching to go shoot something.

"No," Ashley said as she idly inspected her nails.

"Well, I shall tell you anyway, because I'd like to have some other name besides 'The Midget'," said the midget.

"Wait, you're a midget?" Leon said, suddenly interested, "You mean like an Oompa Loompa?" He grinned excitedly at Ashley, "I've always wanted to meet an Oompa Loompa!" Ashley rolled her eyes derisively and appreciatively eyed Leon's butt in an obvious manner when he turned away again. When he didn't notice, she sighed hopelessly and returned to her nails.

"A…what? Oompa Loompa?" said the midget, "No, I am not a…what in God's name…I mean, in the name of Lord Saddler are you talking about?"

"Y'know," said Leon, who was gesturing wildly with his hands, "You're short and you work for Willy Wonka and you make candy and sing songs about how bad children never get any Christmas presents and…and…and dance and sing some more and swim in rivers of…"

"Shut up already!" interrupted the midget, "I am not a…whatever you just said! I am an 8th generation castellan, you _bourgeois_ moron! Me llamo Ramon Salazar!" And Salazar spread his arms dramatically, expecting some level of fear to come from the pair who were now prisoners in his castle.

"Is there a reason why you're speaking Franglish?" Ashley said dryly after a slight silence.

"Yeah," chimed in Leon, "And…yeah. What she said."

"Oh, for God's sake," said Salazar, "Do you people not know anything? Just because I'm Spanish doesn't mean I can't know more than one language. I'm speaking English to you right now!"

"Yeah, but you're also kind of a dork," said Ashley.

"You're speaking English!" said Leon incredulously.

Salazar threw his hands up in the air and stalked off, gesturing to his alien praying mantis creature things to follow him. As he vanished somewhere beyond the balcony, Leon and Ashley were left in the gigantic empty hall alone.

Leon tensed. Surely, after those heavily veiled death threats which he had been lucky to even pick up on, the Oompa Loompa man would send some kind of attack at him. But after a good ten minutes of waiting…nothing. Leon sighed sadly and marched through an archway that led under the balcony. Ashley followed silently, still shamelessly checking out Leon's ass.

In the next hallway, which was pretty much identical to the last one, Leon and Ashley found their way blocked by a giant mural of a knight fighting a gaping hole. "Dang!" said Leon in a manner quite uninspiring, "Guess we gotta find another way. Hey! Let's go into this vaguely ominous, yet well-furnished room with a dungeon-type area on one side."

"Okay," said Ashley. And so on our heroes/heroines went.

In the vaguely ominous, yet well-furnished room, Leon robbed the barrels of the area with glee, happy to finally be able to break something again. He and Ashley walked right by the door to the dungeon because, I mean seriously, who would voluntarily go down into a dungeon area, even if they are incredibly stupid?

However, the way was blocked again, this time not by some random mural or something, but this time by two horses that breathe fire. Yeah, that's right. Doesn't make sense to me, either. Anyway, no matter how hard Leon tried, he couldn't persuade Ashley to crawl through the fire to turn off the Fire Switch on the other side.

"Are you crazy?" Ashley wailed, "My hair is lacquered with hairspray and my skirt is highly flammable; there's no way I'm going anywhere near that fire."

Leon sighed, "Well, I guess I gotta go hit the switch in the dungeon that for some reason is located in the classy part of the castle. I just hope there're no psycho killers down there because then I might be in trouble."

After commanding Ashley not to move from the room under pain of death and loss of her credit cards, Leon ventured down into the creepy dungeon area. Suddenly, he noticed something that chilled his blood. A man wearing a helmet from a suit of armor stood in a little cage near the back of the cell. The man was chained to the wall with chains that were as thick as…well, they were really big chains. But the best part, wait for it…the man's eyes were gone, leaving his empty eye sockets behind. Next to him was the switch.

"Like, whoa," Leon whispered under his breath, "It just figures I've got to go in there next to Blind Man's Bluff in there. I wonder if he'll take a small bribe…"

As Leon approached the cage, the blind dude sprang to life, growling loudly and pulling away from the wall, straining against his chains. Then, just because things can always get worse, the blind dude took out his metal claws.

"OH SHNIKIES!" Leon shouted and made a mad dash for the door. But there was no escape there, because a large metal sheet fell down over the door, trapping Leon in with the Blind Wolverine Dude. Leon began to cry and slid down in a corner of the room, all hope lost as the blind dude stalked closer and closer.

Or at least that's what Leon thought. When he turned around to face the blind guy, the guy was still back in his cage, growling angrily at the fact that the chains were too strong for him to break.

Leon laughed nervously as he moved back to the cage. "Well," he said, "It looks like you're…uh…stuck. Haha. Yeah, you can't hurt me! Haha!" Leon spent the next twenty minutes pulling a Foghorn Leghorn by dancing and mercilessly taunting the Blind Slasher.

"Haw, haw!" said Leon, "You can't get me! And you can't see me! Because guess what? You can't see anything!"

"Hey, Leon!" shouted Ashley from her box seat above the dungeon. Again, one wonders why someone would build a dungeon so that the wealthy upper class can watch the poor tormented souls locked in the dungeon below. But, whatever. Ashley was enjoying the show, it seems. Or not.

"Leon!" she shouted again, "Can you just flip the switch and leave the poor blind guy alone! It's not his fault he's insane and visually challenged."

"Look, shut up, woman!" Leon shouted back, "Let me handle this my way, will you?" He turned back to the blind guy, who had given up trying to escape and was now simply standing and listening. "Look, Blind Guy, I've got a favor to ask."

"My name's Mitch," said the blind guy through the helmet, "Not Blind Guy. I'd appreciate it if you'd show a little more respect to those of us who are lacking in the visual department."

"Or maybe those who are lacking in the…brain department," muttered Leon under his breath. He just couldn't help it; it was too easy.

"What did you say!" said Mitch.

"Nothing, nothing. So, can I ask you a favor?"

"If you'll sign my petition, sure."

"Petition for what?"

"Mistreatment of blind people. I'm organizing a sit-in with my buddies. Right, guys?" He gestured around him to the empty cell, "We're gonna sit here until they acquiesce to our demands. Sign the petition and we'll help you."

Leon looked around the cell, "Dude, you're kind of… never mind. Where's your petition?"

"On the wall over there."

"There's nothing over there."

"Oh. Well, whatever. 'Sok then! What can I do for you?"

"Just pull that lever and then pretend to be dead so the door will open."

"Sure thing." Mitch took out his Wolverine claws and flipped the switch right next to him. Then he died.

"Wow, pretty convincing," Leon murmured in awe, "I almost believed he was dead." The door opened and Leon left the dungeon to rejoin the whiny tramp up above. Leon and Ashley ran through the fire horses (I still don't get who puts fire-breathing horses in their living room), shot a couple hundred dudes in the next room amid Gregorian Chants of Death, turned some cranks, stepped on some buttons and finally, found themselves on the edge of a giant indoor lake.

"Leon, look!" Ashley shrieked, "There's a crank over there! I should go turn it, even though we have no idea what it will do!"

Leon considered this for a moment. On one hand, the crank could do something super-awful, like cause the deployment of a nuclear weapon. On the other hand, what better opportunity to get rid of the whiny bitch? "Okay, Ashley!" Leon said brightly, "Let's go get you killed…I mean, turn that crank!"

Unfortunately, Ashley did not die, although Leon tried his darndest to ignore her as she was repeatedly attacked by the monks. But somehow she always managed to escape and turn that damn crank, which it turns out was to raise some floor panels so they didn't have to wade across the indoor lake, which was only about four inches deep.

So Leon and Ashley found themselves in yet another cavernous room. This one, however was decorated with giant upside-down Venus de Milos stuck to the ceiling. Again, I don't get it. "Maybe Salazar should think about going on Trading Spaces," Leon muttered as they crossed the room, "I bet Hildi could do wonders with this place."

"Who would he switch with?" Ashley remarked dryly, "The giant fish?"

"No need for that tone," Leon retorted, "And he could switch with that Big Cheese guy. His house was sooooo fourteenth century, know what I mean?"

"But didn't you kill him?"

"…Oh, yeah."

Suddenly, Ashley was overtaken with a coughing fit. Seriously, the chick stood there for a good fifteen minutes, coughing her lungs up while Leon just stood by and watched idly.

"Geez, babe, you might want to lay off those cigarettes, you chain smoker," said Leon as she finished coughing.

"I'm not a chain smoker!" Ashley wailed, "And I don't want to die! I'm fine! I'm not a druggie! Leave me alone!" She shoved Leon into the wall and took off running down the nearest corridor, which turned out to be a dead end.

"Ashley, wait!" Leon shouted after her, "You've got my car keys!" Leon took off running after Ashley, but his way was suddenly blocked by several rows of giant spear things that shot up from the ground.

Ashley turned around and realizing the error of her ways, began to cry. "Leon! What's going on?" And because Ashley never learns, she backed away from the spikes until she had backed into the wall. As she hit the wall, three metal rings shot out from the wall, pinning the blonde girl to the wall. As Leon watched from beyond the rows of spikes, the wall turned around with Ashley, wailing for Leon to help her, on it.

Leon stood in stunned silence for a moment. Then, the realization of his situation sunk in. "Hey, where's Ashley?" he said slowly. "Hey, wait. If she's gone…it means I'm free! Whoo-hoo! Time to hit the bars!"

_A/N: PS I do not own any Backstreet Boys lyrics, nor do I own Resident Evil 4 or the Oompa Loompas. I don't believe in slave labor, even if your slaves are being paid with cocoa beans. Stop fooling yourself, Willy Wonka! No, just kidding! I love Willy Wonka! Anywhatzits, merci pour lire-ing mon story! Stay tuned for Chapter One After This One!_


	10. Ch 9: Mutated Animals are the New Pink

**Chapter 9: Mutated Animals Are the New Pink**

Psh crackle crackle. "Hello?"

"Greetings, Meester Kennedy."

"Look, I'm kind of busy finding a place to buy beer right now, so if you could kind of leave me alone…"

"…What? Aren't you scared of what you've seen so far? What about the blind man in the basement? And the scads of people I sent after in that one room?"

"What room? You mean the one with the swimming pool? Pfeh. You call that an attack? Hey, speaking of. Do you know where that blonde chick went that was following me everywhere?"

"Ah ha ha! You mean she fell into one of our lovely traps!"

"Yeah, dude, whatever. So you don't know where she went then?"

"Oh, don't worry, Meester Scott. We'll find her soon enough."

"Great! Because then I don't have to worry about her anymore!"

"… Oh, yes, I almost forgot. We released several of our 'pets' into the sewers. Really, they're giant mutated bugs that vomit acid and are invisible except when flying, but you know, they actually make good house pets."

"Well, you would know."

"What's that supposed to mean!"

"...I dunno. Hey, where'd Hunnigan go, anyway?"

"You haven't figured it out yet, Meester Scott Kennedy? We keeled her and ate her brains for breakfast."

"Goddammit! Why would you do that, you sick little man? She was totally coming on to me!"

"If she was, you could have fooled us. Anyway, we didn't really eat her brains. We just cut off the radio connection. Now _I_ am your only hint as to when you're coming up to a tricky part AND I am your only connection to civilization! Have a nice death, Meester Scott Kennedy. Heeheeheeheeheehee!"

"What? Wait, who is this?" But Salazar had already hung up. Leon eyed the radio nervously, as if he had just gotten a call from the chick in The Ring. "Seven days," Leon muttered, "What did he mean by that? Well, guess I better get going. That beer's not going to buy itself!" Since the hallway he was standing in was a dead end, he found a door off the corridor and ventured on into a dank, cobwebby area with many ladders and corners behind which were excellent places to ambush any unsuspecting, dense blond men.

"What is this, a sewer?" Leon remarked as he waded through the river of knee-deep sludge, "If this is the sewer, where are the 100-foot-long alligators and radioactive ladybugs?"

As Leon's words echoed off the slimy green-ooze covered walls, there was the unmistakable sound of approaching helicopters. Leon's blood froze in terror, or possibly because he felt something gross swim up his pant leg and down into his shoe. Either way, the mood was tense as Leon rounded the corner, fully expecting to run into a fleet of killer helicopters.

_I might not make it out of this alive_, Leon thought soberly, _I only wish I had been able to deliver one more pizza… _Leon reloaded his gun and rounded the corner, screaming his vicious battle cry.

The blood-chilling cry of "Yi yi yi yi yi yi yi yi yi yi!" quickly fell silent as Leon came face to face with what he thought was the evil gang of helicopters, but what turned out to be a bunch of bugs.

"Are you _kidding_ me?" Leon groaned in disappointment, "I thought this was going to be tough. But _bugs_! Please! Just give me a magnifying glass and I'll have these bas…AAUURGH!"

While he was busy complaining, the bugs, (which, incidentally, were about the size of the Chrysler Building. About.) made their attack on Leon, jumping onto his face and dropping about two hundred gallons of pure hydrochloric acid on him. Like a nice, hot shower, only quite caustic and extremely painful.

Leon kicked the bugs off of him and stumbled backward, clutching his face in pain. "That's it," he muttered dangerously, "You bastards are going down, big creepy bug things." With that, Leon whipped out his ultimate weapon: his shotgun. The bugs, who were celebrating and high-fiving each other on an acid attack well-done, stopped and stared in fear at the sleek might of the gun.

No one moved for a good ten minutes. The gun was that scary. Seriously.

Then, Leon made his retaliation. "This is for scorching my corneas, bitch!" He screamed as he emptied a good eighty shotgun shells into the bugs, who were still frozen to the spot with terror. Leon and his Rambo-esque attacks went on until all the bugs had vaporized into little circles of multicolored light denoting what item they had dropped for Leon's use. Leon was once again alone in the creepy dungeon-sewer area.

"What the…" Leon was picking up the items that the Novistadors (bug things) had dropped, "All I needed was one blue piece! ONE! Is that so much to ask for?" To complete his butterfly lamp, Leon needed a red, green, and blue piece. Unfortunately, he had eight green pieces and 40 million red pieces. As Leon stalked around the dungeon-sewer angrily, looking for an f-in' blue piece, he came across a piece of paper in one of the cells.

"Okay, first of all," Leon said to the sky, "Why is there a dungeon in the sewers? It doesn't make any sense! And how many prisons do these people NEED? Seriously!"

"Well, Leon," said the author, "This castle is a relic from 14th century Spain and the Inquisition. I think, like, the entire country was in jail during that time. And if you're going to be so WHINY about it, why don't you just go home?"

"But isn't there something I'm supposed to be doing?" Leon said slowly, his brain actually working for once, remembering some long-ago quest that he was on.

"Yeah, that too. You need to go save that stupid Ashley. And why are you talking to me! I'm supposed to be omniscient! I'm not part of the story! Stop acknowledging me, you idiot!"

"Who's Ashley?"

"Just get your ass through this prison and follow the linear gameplay until you run into an incredibly irritating blonde chick. Take a right at the minor character's death."

"…character's death," said Leon, writing down the directions, "Gotcha. Toodle-oo!" Then, Leon remembered the reason for the pointless tangent. He picked up the piece of paper and read it to himself.

_Memo From the Desk of Luis Sera_, it read in elegant script, _I have been doing countless experiments on the various biological aspects of the Las Plagas, including the way they move, eat, sleep, and play cards. All of my results have been fascinating. However, I feel obligated to thoroughly take note of the myriad of dangers stemming from the Las Plagas. The Las Plagas possess the incredible ability to control…Oh, fuck it._ And underneath in bold, sloppy lettering, _Dudes, the Plaga things are dangerous! They crawl in your ear and eat your brain until you turn into a _ZOMBIE_! That's right! _ZOMBIE_! They lied to you about how there are no _ZOMBIES_in this game!_

"I knew it!" Leon said triumphantly, "There are _always_ zombies!" He crumpled up the note and strode toward the other sewer door, confident in the fact that now that he knew what his enemies were, he could easily defeat them.

But Leon's enemies included more than just 'zombies'. As he opened the door, Leon heard an ominous sound. He rounded the corner and his jaw fell open in disgust. "Oh, hell no," he said, "I'm not doing that!"

He had come upon the castle's most deadly secret: the corridor of Giant Swinging Knives of Death. "Seriously," Leon shouted, "Who BUILDS this kind of shit! How is this even practical?" Then he shrugged, "Oh, well. Nothin' to it but to do it. The things a guy will go through to get beer!"

After much warming up and self talk, Leon ventured across the Swinging Knives bridge thing. All his concentration paid off as Leon was able to run past the knives by going when (gasp!) the knife was not in the way. Miraculously, Leon made it through and found himself in a familiar room.

It was the upside-down Venus de Milo room. In the middle of the room, a flock of Illuminados punks were holding an impromptu cult meeting around the squirming, bloody piece of sacrificial meat. Leon crouched down on the balcony to watch.

"So we decided to have the car wash on the 19th," said the guy in the red robe and the cow skull mask, "All we have to do is get the buckets and soap and make sure the grocery store is okay with us using their parking lot."

"We should make signs!" said one of the faceless black-robed dudes.

"Yeah!" agreed another, "They should say something like, 'Benefit Car Wash – Help Fund Our Hostile World Takeover!'"

"That might be a little too…hostile," said the red guy, "How about 'We Hate America – Help Us Kick Their Butts'? Also, we could make a sign that says something about how we offer modestly priced waxes, too." The black-robed guys all nodded in agreement.

"'We Hate America'!" Leon thought angrily, "I'll show those guys!" He picked up a grenade, pulled the pin, and tossed it down to the floor below.

"Hey, what's this?" said one of the black guys as he picked up the grenade, "Guys, I think it's a sign from God!" All the Illuminados guys freaked out, excited to be sent a divine gift.

"But what does it mean?"

"I think it means…"

"It means 'God hates your car wash', you no-account zombies!" Leon shouted from the balcony. All the Illuminados guys gaped in awe at Leon's sudden appearance. Then, just as they began to move to attack him, the grenade went off. "Well, that was easy," thought Leon as he jumped down, emptied a few clips into the sacrificial meat, just for the hell of it, and went through the door on the other side of the hallway, next to the Merchant. As he walked by the Merchant, he bought some useless items, sold his expensive stuff and 39,999,998 of the red eyes he had picked up in the other room, and shot the Merchant in the foot just to show him who's boss. Then, he went into the next room.

The next room was an art gallery, with semi-pretty, highly pixelated pictures on the walls of people who may or may not have lived in this castle. But really, it doesn't matter. Because there was more important stuff to look at in the room. Crossbowmen, for example. As a flaming arrow missed Leon's face by inches, he took off running around the room, picking off Illuminados lackeys as he went. Then he jumped through a randomly placed window just because, y'know, he could. It had been _sooooo long_ since Leon had been able to jump through a window.

Post-window, Leon sprinted up a corridor while shooting more Illuminados as he ran. The Illuminados barely saw it coming, Leon's stealth-action…action was so…um, stealthy. Leon's stealth-actiony action was so stealthy, he was able to sneak through the entire room and into the next area without the author or the readers noticing.

"Not more paintings!" Leon shouted angrily as he miraculously appeared in the next room. Indeed, one wall of the room had three classic paintings on it. Of people dying. Not something that one usually finds in an art museum. Leon looked at the podium in the middle. It said "The sacrifice of six lives will reveal the true path."

"What the hell does that mean?" Leon asked the podium. The podium shrugged. Leon pondered his conundrum for a while until the solution finally came to him. Grinning maliciously, Leon whipped out his shotgun and blasted a hole in the wall, revealing a door to the next area. Leon did his patented victory dance and moved on.

As Leon entered the next room, a familiar, chilling voice rang out over the room. "What a pleasant surprise," said the white-haired little man formerly introduced as Ramon Salazar, "But I'm afraid it's Ashley we need, not you, Meester Kennedy. I was hoping she would make it in time to come to our lovely tea party in half an hour, but it seems that will have to wait."

"Tea party!" Leon wailed, "But I wanna come too!"

"Tough bran nuggets!" barked Salazar, "You are not welcome because you are an El Americano!"

"But so is Ashley."

"So is Ashley what?"

"American. She's the daughter of the _American_ president."

"Who, Michael Douglas?"

"No. Billy Bob Graham."

"Never heard of him. Either way, she's not _really_ American. She doesn't count."

"What do you mean she doesn't count! She loves shopping and French fries and she has 'Proud To Be An American' on her iPod. How can she not be American!"

"Look, Meester Scott Kennedy, I do not want to get into a semantics debate with a piddlin' little nothing like you. Final word: you are not invited to the tea party."

"If you're not going to invite me to your parties, why don't you just get off my back, Old Man!" Leon shouted at Salazar, tears forming in his eyes. He had _never_ been rejected from a party before. This was a major blow to his ego.

"Did you call me 'old man', Meester Kennedy?" Salazar smiled evilly, "It might come as a surprise, but I am only twenty years old."

"…" said Leon, "Dude, that's not something I'd brag about, if I were you."

"Shut up, you…you…dork!" Salazar shouted, "What would you know about being twenty years old!"

"Been there, done that, Shorty. I'm twenty six. Or something like that. Sometimes, I forget." He struck a pose, "But I look like a sexy eighteen-year-old, right?"

"Rrrrrrrrrrrrgh," Salazar retorted, "I'm gonna tell my killer parasite Plaga friends on you and they're gonna eat your face for saying those bad things about me! My parasites can kick your parasites' butts!"

"That's probably true," said Leon as he cast a doleful eye to the tick that had stealthily attached itself to his arm a few chapters ago (it was so stealthy, you didn't even notice, did you! The mark of a true master!), "Tommy the Tick and Rhonda the Ringworm aren't very tough, even though I told Rhonda she should go to the gym more often…"

"That's not what I was talking about!" Salazar shouted, "I meant your Plaga!"

"I don't have one of those. Where can I get one?"

"We gave you one, you idiot!"

"Really? I don't remember that."

"You were unconscious! You've been coughing up blood because you've got one of our lovely Plagas wrapped around your brainstem!"

Leon considered this. "Nah, I don't believe you," he said, "Although I'd like to get one of those thingies. Can I get one at Wal-Mart? They sell everything at Wal-Mart."

"KILL HIM!" Salazar shouted in a frustrated tone at Leon and he (Salazar) turned to leave the room until later on. At the same time, a herd of Illuminados cult members appeared out of nowhere and proceeded to chase Leon around the room until such time that Leon shot their heads off and raised a secret pedestal out of the floor.

On top of said pedestal rested a goat charm. Somehow, Leon was supposed to remember that the goat charm was one of the pieces that fit into the mural of the knight fighting a gaping hole in the wall way back in the last chapter. But, of course, this is Leon and he forgot about that as soon as he walked through the first door. Still, some nagging feeling told him that the goat charm was important and, at the very least, could possibly be exchanged for some sort of plane ticket to Salt Lake City, Utah. So he shot the rocket launcher totin' guys guarding the goat and pocketed the slightly ugly piece of pewter. And out the door the blond American ran.

On the other side of the door, Leon found himself outside. It was still night outside, which implies that everything that happened between Leon's jacket getting stolen to this point has all happened over the course of, maybe three hours or so. Or Leon had inadvertently stumbled onto a tear in the very fabric of time and was now stuck in a time warp in which it was constantly night and he was surrounded by lunatic Spanish people and whiny little girls.

Either way, the time warp had dumped Leon out on the edge of a hedge maze. Just then, his phone rang. "Hello, Meester Kennedy," said a familiar voice.

"Oh, dammit," Leon cursed, "Not you again. Didn't I talk to you, like, three paragraphs ago? Why can't you just leave me alone?"

"Because it is in my contract to make life difficult for you," said Salazar, "And also, I have a massive crush on you, you hot sexy man, you."

"What!"

"What?"

"What did you just say?"

"…It's in my contract to make life difficult for you?"

"After that."

"What?"

"After…oh, never mind. So, what's the word?"

"I just wanted to bid you farewell, Meester Scott Kennedy, as you will be dying in the next scene. My puppy dogs will see to that much. Heeheeheeheehee!"

"Wait, you're sending your…puppies after me? First your mindless drone dudes and now your little fluffy dogs? When are you going to come after me yourself, you sissy man?"

"Not for another few chapters. I am too afraid and intimidated by your sexy hotness to confront you face-to-face."

"What?"

"…I said…um…YOU DIE NOW!" Salazar hung up the walkie-talkie.

"The dangers of Internet dating," muttered Leon, "It would seem that I've acquired another stalker. I'll have to tell Hunnigan that she's not alone in the quest to get in my pants." Leon thought about what he said and shivered with revile. Then he curled up in a fetal position and as the chapter ended, he was sucking on his thumb, trying to forget about the fact that a two-foot-tall Spanish man was in love with him.

Just kidding! Chapter not over! We just needed to give Leon some time alone. But within a relatively short time, Leon's brain had rebooted and he was chomping at the bit to shoot something in the face. Before the authoress could stop him, Leon had swan-dove into the maze and was now running toward some unknown destination.

"Wait, Leon!" I shouted, "There's a trick to the maze! Come back!"

But it was too late. Leon was in full-out 'Gotta Shoot Something' mode. He dashed up and down the maze path, blasting Salazars so-called puppies (more like deranged psycho octopus-dogs) away. Finally, he managed to find two halves of some moon thing that you need to unlock the door. When he got back up to the door, I was waiting for him.

"Leon, you putz!" I reprimanded him, "There was a lot easier way to do that whole thing! You made me waste a whole paragraph of mindless jabbering that probably wasn't funny at all! You're making me lose my touch, you butthead!"

"Fine," Leon sighed with all the drama of a thirteen-year-old girl, "What was _your_ idea?"

"Set the maze on fire."

Leon's eyes glittered, "Ooh, good idea! I'll do that next time, 'kay?"

"There won't be a next time, Leon," I sighed, "Look, I don't care what you do. From now on, you're on your own. Except for when there are crazy-long and uber-boring battle scenes. Those I will continue to skip in less than five sentences. But otherwise, you'll have to fend for yourself."

"Hey," said Leon, "This may be a bit off-topic, but you're a girl, right, Ms. Authoress Person?"

"Excellent observation, Captain Obvious. What's your point?"

"You interested in a date, sweet cheeks?"

Suddenly, Leon acquired a massive bruise around his right eye and found himself staring up at the dark night sky. "Wow!" he said, impressed, "You punched me out without even touching me! I'm even more attracted to you now!"

"Idiot," I said as I retreated back beyond the fourth wall, "No wonder the only reason he's alive right now is because I can't kill off the lead. Or can I…?"

But now was not the time for Leon to die. Instead, he picked himself up, smeared a green herb on his face, which magically made his face completely better, and went through the door into Salazar's bedroom.

Suddenly, Leon felt the barrel of a gun against his back. "Put your hands where I can see them," said a female voice behind Leon.

_Now's the time for me to be super-witty so I can get this girl to date me_, Leon thought. "Sorry, lady, but I don't follow a lady's lead…when I dance…wait, that's not right. Hang on."

"Put 'em up. Now," said the vaguely Asian-looking, quite attractive (if you're attracted to the whorish, slutty, assassin type, I mean) woman.

"I always lead…when it comes to…shit," said Leon, still trying to make his quip work, "Ladies leading just isn't…what…works for…oh, screw it. I TRAP YOU!"

Okay, now imagine your favorite battle scene from The Matrix. Okay, now condense the awesomeness of the whole thing down to about ten seconds, so it's super-concentrated awesome. Okay? Right, now add in a handful of ninjas, a bunch of pirates, and cool battle graphics.

That's nothing like what happened here.

What happened was that the world went into bullet-time. Leon did some nifty turn to steal Slutty McSkank's gun and toss it across the room, where the bullets exploded into a purple mini-mushroom cloud. Then, Slutty McSkank tried to cartwheel over to reach her gun, which wouldn't have worked at his point anyway, but who's counting, right? As she stood up, Leon retaliated with his super-deadly Paring Knife of Doom.

"A word of advice next time; use knives," said Leon, "Works better for close encounters…of the third kind." He cast a conspiratorial glance out the door and stepped away from the tramp who was now standing in front of him.

"Leon," the vaguely Asian skank said as she pulled her sunglasses off, "It's been a long time."

"Tammy."

"No, my name's…"

"Susan?"

"No."

"Stephanie. Angela. Missy. Gina. Anne. Heather? Carrie. Jennifer? Markette? Bobette. Betty Sue Jimmy Jo Johnson Smith? Bathsheba. Steve?"

"No, Leon, you don't remember me? I'm…"

"Milk Carton? New York City?"

"I'm Ada, you asshole! Ada!"

"Oh, I remember now!" Leon grinned, "Christy! It's been a while, eh?"

"Have you been hitting the drugs again?"

"…No."

Ada sighed. "Whatever. You know you still want me."

"Ada. So it's true."

"True? About what?"

"You're still a dirty ho."

"And you're surprised?"

"…I plead the fifth. So what's new with you?"

"I'm working for Wesker, since you're not going to ask."

"Who's Wesker?"

"He wants to eat your soul. He's evil."

"Then why are you working for him?"

"Because I want to get back at you for dumping me six years ago in Raccoon City. Someone's got to teach you a lesson, you man-whore."

"Hey, I didn't dump you! You lied to me and said you had a boyfriend, but really didn't cuz you were using me to steal the T-Virus from Umbrella or whatever... Do you realize we've said the word 'whore' at least…twice in this scene?"

"And your point is? We both are quite whorish, if you ask me. I mean, you chase after anything with a pulse…"

"Except that creepy Spanish dude that has a crush on me."

"Who? Luis?"

"Luis has a crush on me!"

"Oops. I promised I wouldn't tell."

"OH GOD! No, I was talking about Salazar."

"Okay, so anything _reasonable_ with a pulse. And, well, just look at me. I'd say we're both quite whorish."

"Speak for yourself, you hussy. I'm not a hoe. I'm a garden rake!"

"…Whatever. Now it's time for me to disappear." Ada dropped her sunglasses (why was she wearing sunglasses at night anyway?), which exploded into a firey ball of non-lethal white smoke and by the time the smoke cleared, she was gone.

Leon shook his head, "There she goes. I'll see you in the next chapter, baby. Hopefully by then, you'll have come to terms with your undying love for me. 'Till then, Slut on, Slutbag!"

* * *

_A/N: Hey, all. Yet another chapter up and running. As for the next chapter, it'll be another encounter with Luis and Ashley's little adventure. I've been toying with the idea of doing that one in first person, but I dunno yet. Anyway, enjoy! Next chapter up soon!_  



	11. Ch 10: Dude, Where's My Lung?

**Chapter 10: "Dude, I Can See Your Lung..."  
**

So you know how weird it is when you run into your ex after six years or so and you've got nothing intelligent to say to them except, "So…" and the moment is so awkward that you're afraid your head is going to explode with all the awkwardness that's slowly filling the room? That's not really what happened in the last chapter.

In case you're just joining us, the last chapter ended with Leon being a doof and his sort-of ex-girlfriend-who-really-wasn't-a-girlfriend-so-much-as-a-crazy-hitman-woman-who-was-trying-to-manipulate-Leon-into-doing-her-bidding (or as we like to call her in "I Hate The Hyphen Button Land", Ada) retaining her skank status and escaping in a giant cloud of smoke. So far in this fiasco, Leon has completely failed in pretty much every single mission he has been ordered to carry out: every mission being one mission. Let's watch and see if he can redeem himself! Or at least find some beer.

After Ada vanished in a puff of smoke, Leon picked up his jaw off the floor, took a cold shower to bring himself back to his senses and left the bedroom. He felt it was kind of creepy hanging around in the bedroom of his so-far arch-nemesis; that and the large posters of himself with "I HEART YOU!" written in crayon on them and the giant cardboard cutout of himself (Leon) were slightly unnerving.

Out in the hall, Leon wandered aimlessly around for a while, shooting inanimate objects just for the hell of it and breaking every single window he could find. Eventually, he found his way to a really poorly planned dining room with the world's most obscure puzzle written on the walls and several vaguely threatening guys lounging around drinking some Heineken.

"I'm telling you, dude," said one of the vaguely threatening cult members, "I don't think Lord Saddler's plan's going to work. I mean, what? He's going to marry Ashley, isn't that it? I mean, where'd he get that idea? Lemony Snickett?"

Vaguely Threatening Cult Member #2 shrugged, "I dunno, I haven't seen that movie. I hear it's not very good."

"Are you loony?" VTCM #3 shouted, slamming his beer onto the table, "Jim Carrey is genius! And how can you hate the Series of Unfortunate Events books? You have to be lacking a soul or something!"

"Well, yeah," said VTCM #2, "It's been replaced with a centipede-like parasite. Duh."

"Oh, yeah," said VTCM #3.

"HEY!" Leon shouted finally, unable to take the torture of watching the cult members drink his beer, "Where'd you BASTARDS get that beer! Tell me and I'll shoot your heads off!"

"Doesn't he mean '_or_ he'll shoot our heads off?" asked VTCM #1.

"Al, he's an American, and a really stupid one at that. What do you think he means?" replied VTCM #2 crisply.

"Should we tell him that there's more beer through the kitchen and that all he needs to do is shoot the meat on the painting over there in that funky corner?" asked VTCM #3.

"Yeah, why not?" said VTCM #1.

Unfortunately this entire conversation was in Spanish and as we have already established before, Leon chose to take French in high school instead of Spanish. Leon therefore chose to interpret the conversation as follows: "Blah blah blah blah beer blah blah blah blah Damn American, let's not tell him where the beer is blah blah."

"Think you can hide the beer from me, do you?" Leon shouted as he whipped out his gun and shot the VTCM dudes in the head, "I warned you!" The VTCM guys in turn pulled out their Plagas and bravely ran away through the door that magically appeared in the wall that had a sign above it reading, "Kitchen – Shoot the Meat for Beer". Sadly, this sign was also in Spanish. This was obviously not Leon's day.

Leon spent the next four hours reading the four little plaques around the room, and then the next two hours after that studying the giant painting of food at the end of the hall. The painting was of a loaf of bread, some sort of dessert, a plate of roast beef with a bright red circle drawn around it and a big red arrow pointing toward it and a bottle of wine with a red X splashed over it. Leon just couldn't figure it out. In frustration, he emptied several clips of bullets into the paintings and, by some miracle, failed to hit the meat at all. Instead, he somehow managed to shoot all the bullets into the wine bottle, which mysteriously exploded and splashed wine everywhere.

"Wait a minute," Leon mused, "How does a painting of a wine bottle have actual wine in it?" But Leon's thoughts were interrupted as a door opened to his left. Leon could hardly resist an open door and so he ran through it without a moment's hesitation.

In the next room, Leon found a pedestal with a freakin' huge treasure chest on top. Leon's eyes sparkled. Surely the treasure chest contained something crazy-awesome, like a Porsche or a mansion in Beverly Hills! As Leon neared the pedestal, a big ol' cage dropped down from the ceiling and a Blind Slasher jumped down from the balcony above.

"Well, this is unfortunate," Leon said wryly as he reloaded his gun.

This was a mistake. The moment breath escaped Leon's lungs, the Blind Slasher roared and slashed blindly at Leon's throat. The blades that were mysteriously stuck into the dude's hands tore through Leon's neck like…well, like blades through a blond American who formerly owned a snappy bomber jacket way back in the first few chapters (Hah! Bet you forgot about that jacket, eh!).

"Crap!" thought Leon, "I could be in trouble this time. In fact," he thought as gallons and gallons of blood gushed from some unknown source, "Considering how much blood is lying on the floor, I could be dying. Better do something about this." With the speed and precision of a professional surgeon, Leon dug a green herb out of his pocket. The herb was slightly crumpled and was still in its little terra cotta pot. One wonders how Leon could move with all the little terra cotta pots he had in his pocket. Through some miraculous procedure, Leon managed to completely heal the gaping hole across his neck, erase the scar it should have left, and also managed to correct his vision. "Great!" He said as he looked around, "I don't need those reading glasses anymore! Dude, why doesn't Walgreen's sell this shit!"

This was a mistake. The Blind Slasher heard Leon again and the whole last two paragraphs repeated themselves, much to the author's chagrin. _Oh, for God's sake_, she thought, _There's no way I'm typing all of that out again…wait. I gots an idea…_ With just a quick few keystrokes, the author executed a brilliant copy-and-paste tactical maneuver.

The moment breath escaped Leon's lungs, the Blind Slasher roared and slashed blindly at Leon's throat. The blades that were mysteriously stuck into the dude's hands tore through Leon's neck like…well, like blades through a blond American who formerly owned a snappy bomber jacket way back in the first few chapters (Hah! There's that jacket again!).

"Crap!" thought Leon, "I could be in trouble this time. In fact," he thought as gallons and gallons of blood gushed from some unknown source, "Considering how much blood is lying on the floor, I could be dying. Better do something about this." With the speed and precision of a professional surgeon, Leon dug a green herb out of his pocket. The herb was slightly crumpled and was still in its little terra cotta pot. One wonders how Leon could move with all the little terra cotta pots he had in his pocket. Through some miraculous procedure, Leon managed to completely heal the gaping hole across his neck, erase the scar it should have left, and also managed to correct his vision. "Great!" He said as he looked around, "I don't need those reading glasses anymore! Dude, why doesn't Walgreen's sell this shit!"

The Blind Slasher retaliated again, but this time, Leon had learned from his previous mistakes. As the Blind Slasher broke out his wicked knife-fingernails, Leon ducked and deftly blasted a hole through the door of the cage.

"Booyah!" Leon shouted as he dashed out the hole and ran around the cage. "Hey, you blind punk! Whatcha gonna do, bitch? You can't get me now! Haw!"

"You know," said the Blind Slasher with a heightened degree of eloquence, "It's rather boorish to insult such a visually challenged individual as myself, _Monsieur_ Kennedy. I am quite sure that my lawyers would have something to say and perhaps even a court order for your impertinence."

"Dude," Leon replied, "You tried to cut my head off. In fact, you _did_ cut my head off. Twice."

"I say," said the Blind Slasher, "I am quite sorry about that. I was lead to believe you were in fact a raccoon or some similar creature raiding my garbage cans again."

"Wait, what?" Leon sputtered, "You thought I was a raccoon? What would make you even think that? And what garbage cans?"

The Blind Slasher shrugged wordlessly.

"Whatever," Leon said, "Look, I got stuff to do, guy. Is it all right if I just skip this cage death match and go?"

"I suppose."

"Peachy," Leon said, "Think you could give me directions or whatnot?"

"Of course, my good man," said the Blind Slasher. Pulling out a sheet of parchment and an elegant fountain pen, the Blind Slasher drew out a beautifully detailed map of the nearby rooms. Seriously, this map was, like, museum-quality. The map was so detailed that it revealed the location of the secret teleporter that magically transported Leon right next to a giant case full of crazy-cool weapons.

"Sweet!" Leon grinned as he stuffed his pockets with highly dangerous munitions, "A rocket launcher! I knew someone cared about me! And it sure wasn't YOU!" He whipped around and pointed menacingly at the Merchant, who was standing in the corner of the room.

"How did you catch me?" the Merchant muttered in his gruff, lower-class English way, "This disguise was perfect!"

Leon raised his eyebrow at the Merchant's disguise. "Hey, I may be dense," he said, "But even I'm going to notice a guy dressed in a giant duck costume standing in the corner of a Renaissance-era room."

The Merchant glanced down at the duck costume he was wearing and sighed, "Damn, I thought I had it this time. Oh, well." He waddled away, the feet on the costume making quacking noises as he walked.

Leon watched the Merchant leave, a perplexed look on his face. "Well, that was weird," he muttered, "Is anything on this mission going to make sense?" He thought about this for a minute, thinking back over the past dozen hours. "Guess not," he shrugged and followed the Merchant into a dirty little corridor and then through another door that led to a large atrium-like room. Except not really an atrium, because the entire room was very dark and had absolutely no skylights of any sort. In fact, the entire place was lit with torches, which seems slightly impossible. Leon wandered a few feet into the room, peeking behind corners and into cabinets, just in case any clever jerk had decided to hide beer in the room.

Suddenly, Leon heard the door slam open behind him and he whirled around, waving his gun frantically. "Trying to sneak up on me, eh?" he shouted, "No one sneaks up on the legendary… oh. It's you."

Luis was standing in the doorway. He waved around a little blue vial, a smile plastered on his face, "Leon, I got it!"

"Got what?"

"Got…what?" Luis said exasperatedly, "I got the…the sample. Remember? I told you about that?"

"No, you didn't."

"Well, anyway, I got the saAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!" Luis screamed as a huge spike thing speared through his chest and lifted him several feet off the ground.

"Hey, Luis?" Leon said carefully, "You okay, dude?"

"What the FUCK do you think!" Luis screamed, "I've got a giant spike through my chest!" The little blue vial slipped from his hand and dropped into the waiting hand of Osmund Sadder, owner of the spike thing. Saddler wiggled his spike, knocking Luis to the ground. Saddler retracted the spike back under his robes and grinned evilly. "Now that I have the sample, you serve me no purpose," he sneered at Luis, who wasn't even paying attention at this point, the giant hole in his chest proving to be a more pressing issue than the creepy hooded Spanish man with mysterious spikes under his robes.

Leon, however was not distracted by a major, fatal wound. "Dude!" he yelled at Saddler, who was turning to leave, "You can't just stab a hole through my vague acquaintances and then run away! I got some questions for you!"

Saddler turned back to face Leon. "I suppose I can answer a few questions for someone who will be dead shortly. What do you want?"

"What the HELL was that spike thing!" Leon wailed, slightly freaked out by the whole episode.

"Trust me," Saddler smiled maliciously, "You don't want to know…" Then, he turned and disappeared through the door. Leon thought about this answer, then shivered violently. "Eeeew!"

"Aaaugh!" Luis screamed from the floor, where he was amazingly still alive and quite vocal, "Leon! Come here!"

Leon kneeled next to Luis. "Hey, Luis, how can you be still alive? See, normally, when people get stabbed in the chest like that, they tend to die almost instantaneously, right? So I'm just wondering…"

"I am a researcher hired by Saddler," Luis said, speaking as if he hadn't heard what Leon just said. He chuckled dryly, "I guess he found out what I was up to." His chuckling turned into violent coughing and Luis trailed off dramatically.

"See, I don't see what you being a researcher has to with the fact that you're even still talking," Leon continued, "I mean, I can see your lung, dude." He poked Luis' lung gingerly and Luis screamed again, "That's not really a good thing…"

Luis handed Leon a bottle of pills. "These should suppress the growth of the parasite," he croaked, "Also, if you take more than one at a time, they make good hallucinogens."

"Sweet!"

"I know," Luis agreed, "But before you do that, there's something more important that you have to do."

"I'm gonna try out these pills right now!"

"No! You must retrieve the sample! Saddler took it and you must get it back!"

"Why?"

"It's…" Luis paused, "I don't know. All I know is that some strange force is commanding me to tell you to get it!

"Look, I don't know if I really want to waste all that time getting a stupid jar of viruses. Can't I just get high off these pills instead?"

"No! You must…retrieve…the samp…urk!"

"Luis? Luis! Yo, Luis!" Leon slapped Luis's face, trying to wake up his vague acquaintance, but it was no use. Luis was dead.

"LUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUIIIIIIIIIIIIS!" Leon shouted with such heartfelt pain, that the zealots who were sneaking up behind him to kick his ass stopped and broke down into tears of sympathy. Leon stood up, calmly disposed of the zealots, then dropped back to his knees, "NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!" He dry heaved a few times, then sighed and stood up. "Okay, I'm done," he said to Luis, "I'll get your damn sample back. It's the least I could do for the hallucinogenic drugs you gave me." He gave Luis the thumbs up and walked down a weird little bridge thing onto a pedestal in the center of the room. His blood curdled as he heard a familiar voice pierce the silence.

"LEEEEEEEEEOOOOOOOOOOON!" said the whiny female voice, "HEEELP!"

"Oh, sweet cuppin' cakes!" Leon cried, "Not you again!"

_A/N: Sorry about the Blind Slasher thing. I'm pretty sure that must have kicked my rating up a notch. blushes sheepishly Whatever! So the next chapter is the Ashley By Herself chapter. Don't know what I'm going to do for that... Thanks for your interest in my story and keep reading!_


	12. Ch 11: Ashley the NotSoUnarmed Heroine

**Chapter 11: Ashley the Not-So-Unarmed Heroine**

Ashley Graham was not a happy camper. Four days ago, she had been a normal college student, spending her days flirting her way through Psychology class and her nights partying at frat parties. Now, here she was, stuck in Spain or Lithuania or wherever, she had been here so long, she'd kind of forgotten. Anyway, it didn't matter. All that mattered was that she didn't have her Burt's Bees and her lips so freakin' chapped, it wasn't even funny. Also, she hadn't checked her messages in, like, forever and she was _sure_ that Brett had called about going out this Thursday and if Leon made her miss her chance to go out with the star forward of the basketball team, someone was going to be in big trouble. That someone being Leon.

Now, Ashley was trapped against a wall by three metal rings. She was kind of regretting running away from Leon like that. After all, he only wanted to help and she was being kind of whiny anyway. She struggled against the rings, but she didn't try very hard. Her skirt was caught between the lowest ring and the wall. If she pulled too hard, she might rip her skirt and that was unacceptable. So she gave up and contented herself with screaming for help at the top of her lungs until she heard a familiar voice.

"Oh, sweet cuppin' cakes, not you again!"

Ashley looked up at a balcony above where she stood and her face lit up when she saw Leon standing at the edge of the platform. "Leon!" she shouted, "Help me!"

"Where'd you come from?" Leon shouted back irritably.

"I've been here for four hours!" Ashley yelled, "What took you so long?"

"No, really! How'd you get there? I thought you went home!"

"How would I have gotten home, idiot? We're in the middle of Medieval Spain!"

Leon shrugged, "I dunno. You could have done it."

Ashley sighed. He may be dumb as a stump, but at least he was cute. "I got an idea," she shouted, "How about you save my life and get me out of here?"

"I dunno…" Leon replied, "I'm kind of busy right now…"

"If you don't, I'll scream some more."

Leon laughed derisively, "I think you're bluffing. I don't think you'll do it."

"LEEEEEEEOOOOOOOOOON! HEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE…"

"OKAY! Shut up already! I'll get you out of there, but you won't like it."

"Just do it!"

Leon rifled through his briefcase for an appropriate piece of ammo. "How about this?" he said as he held up a grenade, "No good? What about this baby?" He picked up the rocket launcher and hefted it onto his shoulder, "Isn't this sweet? Can I use this?"

"No!" Ashley shouted. She gasped as a nearby door opened and a fleet of Illuminados dudes ran out and surrounded her. "Leon! Save me!"

"Hang on, babe," Leon replied as he fumbled with his sniper rifle. He spread out an owner's manual on the ground and read it out loud to himself, "In case of accident, air bag on LS-1 Sniper Rifle will deploy. Do not let small children operate rifle, as air bags are hazardous to children under the age of twelve. Hey, Ashley! What does 'hazardous' mean?"

"Leon! Please help me!" Ashley wailed as the zealots paced closer.

"Yeah, yeah," Leon muttered, "Whine, whine, whine. That's all you do, isn't it?" He loaded the gun, took aim, and fired. The bullet broke the lowest ring, missing Ashley's leg by an inch and she shrieked loudly. Several of the zealots' heads exploded as a result of the shriek and Leon's mouth fell open in awe. "Hey!" he said, "How'd you do that?"

"It's my secret talent," Ashley said, "Now save me!"

"…You're gonna scream like that again, aren't you?"

"No! I promise I won't scream again."

"Promise?"

"Yes!"

"Pinky-swear?"

"Yes! Wait…"

"Okay." Leon fired two quick shots and broke the last two rings. Ashley screamed again, popping the heads of the remaining zealots. "HEY!" Leon shouted, "You promised you wouldn't do that again!"

"You just shot at me! Twice! What's your excuse?"

Leon shrugged, "It was fun?"

"Oooh!" Ashley frowned at Leon, "You are _such_ a major jerk!" She looked around, "Are there stairs anywhere? How am I supposed to get out of here?"

Leon shrugged, "Maybe you could try flying?"

Ashley glared at him, "Was that supposed to be serious?"

"Yeah," Leon said, "Why not?"

Ashley narrowed her eyes, "I hope someone keys your car."

"Ha! Joke's on you!" Leon laughed, "I don't have a car!"

Ashley rolled her eyes. "I'm never going to get out of here," she whined, "I'm going to die here! And I'll never pass Psych 306 this semester!" Suddenly, a door to the right lit up. I mean, literally lit up, a bright yellow. It flashed a few times and letters appeared above it, reading, "This Way To Certain Death."

"Hey," Leon said, pointing to the flashing door, "Try that door."

Ashley looked at the door and shrugged, "No better options, I guess." She flashed one last angry look at Leon and headed through the door.

"I can't believe I'm doing this," Ashley complained as she wandered around the rooms beyond the door, "I should have made that butthead toss down one of his guns at least. Not that I know how to use it… I'd probably get gunpowder on my blouse and I'm _so_ sure that would never come out." She turned a corner and froze.

In the next room sat a zombie cult member, completely absorbed with playing a Gameboy. The beep-beep-boop of the game sent a chill down Ashley's preppie spine, numbing her ability to do anything except put on lip gloss. She did so and with that sudden movement, the Gameboy cult member continued playing his game, ignoring the girl completely, even though she was in plain sight and might as well have been wearing a giant sign over her head saying, "I am Vulnerable; Kidnap me Now!"

After a while, Ashley realized the cult guy, as absorbed as he was with his Nintendog, wasn't going to come after her. She laughed mockingly and dashed behind him into the room. This was a mistake. As she ran across the room, the batteries on the Gameboy died suddenly and without warning. The cult member screamed with bloodcurdling anger and threw the Gameboy across the room. The hunk of plastic beaned Ashley on the head and she shrieked in a whiny manner, "Oww! OMG!"

"Ahi esta!" the cult member cried, pointing in a threatening manner to the girl who had been standing there all along, surprise, surprise. Ashley, now mortally injured from the Gameboy dragged herself to the far side of the room and crawled under a table to find a safe spot on the other side. The cult member lumbered closer, but try as he might, he couldn't figure out how to get around that damn table shield device. Instead, he did some sort of moonwalk in which he appeared to be walking forward, but really wasn't moving anywhere. Yeah. It takes skill to pull that off.

"Oh, God, I so totally don't, like, want to die!" Ashley wailed as she curled into a fetal position in her secret hiding place. In a flurry of panic, Ashley picked up the nearest thing and threw it at the cult member. Unfortunately for Ashley, large stuffed purple otters holding cardboard hearts that say, "I Wuv Woo!" don't do much damage to zombie cult members. Also unfortunately, this time for the cult member, he (the cult member) was not a zombie; he was a parasite-infested walking corpse. And large stuffed purple otters holding cardboard hearts that say "I Wuv Woo!" are quite fatal to walking corpses. The cult member caught the otter and disintegrated on the spot into a pile of those little candy hearts you get at Valentine's Day.

"…Well, that was interesting." Ashely muttered. She crawled out from under the table, pulled Random Lever Numero One and continued on down the passage, which, for some reason, had gates blocking the library off from the rest of the castle, as if the owner was afraid the books would suddenly get up and orchestrate a well-choreographed attack. Because, you know, books do that. All the time.

In the next room, Ashley found more of the cult members. And by members, I mean one. This one wasn't playing a Gameboy; he was fully alert and sewing a green skull patch onto his Illuminados robes. Strangely enough, he also did not notice Ashley as she snuck in, clomping around on the stone floors with her hugemongous uggs that made an unbelievable ruckus everywhere she went. Ashley snuck into the room and immediately detected her weapon of choice: a big mint green bunny rabbit that was holding a heart that read, "You're My Cutsey-Wootsy-Kins!"

The Illuminados dude was so immersed in his sewing, that he was not aware of his impending doom until he heard the chilling voice say, "Hey, Mr. Cult Man. Look what I got." He turned around and his blood (or lack thereof) turned to ice when he saw the Catholic school wannabe girl holding the rabbit with a smug look on her face.

"Oh, my Saddler!" he cried, "What are you wearing! UGGS! Girlfriend, you need to take those off and burn them immediately!"

Ashley's face darkened, "Are you insulting my uggs? Yeah, I'm talking to YOU! ARE YOU INSULTING MY UGGS!"

"I think so!" the cult dude shouted back, "Those boots are a crime against humanity and all that is good with the world!"

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!" Ashley shouted, unleashing her fearsome battle cry as she magically morphed, Sailor Moon style, from an innocent (Ha!) college prep to a Xena-esque warrior princess dressed in the complete leather ensemble. The stuffed rabbit disappeared and was replaced by a magical bow and arrow with hearts and rainbows all over it and suddenly glitter began raining down from the ceiling.

"NO!" the Illuminados man screamed. He shielded his face with his hands as the glitter poured down like fire from the sky, if fire were glittery and silver and wasn't actually on fire, "The flesh! It burns! NOOOOO!" Ashley took aim with her bow and let loose an arrow with a pretty little flower at the end. When the arrow hit the cult member, he burst into purple flame and disappeared. The red glow from Ashley's eyes subsided and she glared at the scorch mark on the floor from where the Illuminados man had stood. "NEVER," she said coldly, eyes ablaze with pure fury, "Insult my uggs."

Xena, Warrior Ashley continued down the library corridors to find a secret passage lined with suits of armor. She eyed them nervously, as they were animated differently than the landscape and it was really obvious that they would soon play an important part in the situation. At the end of Armor Corridor, Ashley found some weird room in which there were barred gates hanging all over the place. She pressed a bunch of random buttons and followed the staircase beyond to find herself in the Castle Root Cellar. Stacked all around her were piles of potatoes and onions, dozens and dozens of jars of canned beets and corn, and about five hundred suits of armor. And one very annoying puzzle.

"GOD DAMMIT!" Ashley yelled as she neared the pedestal in the middle of the room. On the pedestal was one of those stupid sliding block games, where you have to reassemble the picture. Except this one was super-super evil. It would take the normal person nearly eight hundred hours to solve the damn thing. Ashley beat it to death with a large pink mace and a secret door opened slowly, as if it were in pain. Ashley laughed wickedly, her secret violent side showing through. She wished Leon were here and that he was ignoring her so she could kick his ass.

In the next room, Ashley picked up some random treasures that you couldn't see because it was dark. Therefore, they don't matter. All you need to know is that they were important and that one of them was a secret button that makes the world go crazy. And that's just what happened when Ashley picked up the Crazy Medallion. The world went crazy.

As she picked up the whatever-thing, all the suits of armor from the next room suddenly came to life and began chasing Ashley around the Root Cellar of Doom. This would be comical, except that one cannot see what the hell is going on because it is FREAKIN' PITCH BLACK! AAAAAAAAAAAAA! Ahem. So, yes. It was dark and Ashley was running around, screaming like the sissy girl she is.

I know what you're thinking. Why didn't Xena-Ashley just turn around and pound the suits of armor into piles of dust in the ground? Well, psh. You should know the answer to that! It would be too easy for Ashley to escape if she wasn't being chased by a Legion Army of the Undead Suits Of Armor. Instead, Ashley ran away, back up the corridors she came down, through the gate room, into the Library of the Demon Books and up some weird ladder. At the top of the ladder was a door that led to…gasp! Leon!

"'Bout time, bitch," Leon drawled as Ashley ran into the room, "I was wondering how long it would take you to get your fat ass up here…hey!"

Ashley was so glad to be alive, she didn't even realize she had catapulted herself into Leon's arms. Leon was so stunned by this sudden Girl Contact that he stood frozen to the spot, unable to function. Which was fine by Ashley. If he had been functioning, Leon probably would have tried to grab her butt.

"Okay, that's enough of that," Ashley said, jumping away from Leon, "Are you going to save me or what?"

Leon, slowly realizing his situation, glared at Ashley. Suddenly, the memories of the awful times before his quest for beer began all those chapters ago came flooding back: everything from trying to keep this stupid girl from getting shot to trying to keep her from getting stolen by zombie-people. Stealthily, he edged closer to her, noting how closely she stood to the edge of the second-floor balcony. Just as he reached over to put his hand on her shoulder, Ashley screamed.

"LUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIS!" Ashley's blood-curdling scream rang off the cheap, Menards pseudo-marble of the room and the heads of the two-dozen or so Illuminados cult freaks that were sneaking up on the pair from behind exploded.

"Well, that was weird," Leon muttered, examining the cult dudes curiously, "Who knew that her voice could do that? Oh, wait. Why am I surprised?" He glared at Ashley.

Ashley hadn't noticed the cult dudes, though. She sobbed wildly as she ran forward and threw herself on Luis's mangled body. "Oh, my love!" she wailed, "Hang on, Luis! We'll get you help! Stay with me!"

"Wait," Leon said slowly, "You've only seen him…twice. And one of those times, he made a comment on your boobs."

"It was true love, damn you!" Ashley cried, "True love!" She sobbed a few more times, then stood up. "Goodbye, Luis, my love. I'll never forget you!"

Leon watched Ashley as she bid Luis farewell and headed for the nearest door. He muttered under his breath, "You got over that fastOW! Geez! No need to HIT me!"

"Let's go," Ashley said tensely as she left the room.

Leon stood still for a moment in the silent room. Then, there was a groan and Luis sat up, rubbing his head. "Aye caramba," he muttered, "That was one hell of a party…" He looked around and noticed Leon standing nearby and he waved, "Hey, amigo."

"Hey," Leon nodded back, all cool-like, "How're you doin'?"

"I've been better," Luis remarked as he stood up. He gestured to the giant hole in his chest, "Can't say this is any fun, though. Well, _c'est la vie_. Better be goin', amigo." He turned and headed for the door Ashley had just left through.

"Luis." Luis turned and Leon continued, "Might not want to go through that door."

"Gotcha," Luis gave Leon a thumbs-up and headed for the balcony.

"Luis."

Luis sighed and turned back, "What?"

"I'll never forget you, man!" Leon sobbed.

Luis's dark eyes glittered with repressed tears. "See ya around," he said, his voice low and strained. He and Leon exchanged one last glance and he turned back to the balcony and jumped off, vaulting off the railing with an extra flourish. Just as he disappeared, he was back again, magically riding a large green and purple hang-glider. He waved once more at Leon and disappeared in a puff of smoke.

"What a great guy," Leon said, his voice shaky. He watched the puff of smoke until it was gone, sighed happily, then said, "What was his name again?" He shrugged and wandered toward the door to follow Ashley deeper into the castle and even farther into trouble.

_A/N: Chapter 11 up and running. Boy, there's a lot of all-caps in this chapter! I don't know what's coming up next, but I should get started on it soon. Thanks for your patience and your support! Finally, just because I haven't done one in a while, a_

_DISCLAIMER: I don't own any of the characters, events, pieces of literature or media, or any other already-owned thing I may mention in any chapter of this fanfic. Don't sue me; it's not worth it.  
_


	13. Ch 12: Heavy Ammunition

**Chapter 12: In Which Ashley Stores Heavy Ammunition in her Cleavage**

Leon followed Ashley into the next room, which turned out to be Obligatory Lava Room of Doom. "Ha! That rhymes!" Leon laughed, "Let's go, chicken-wuss," he gestured to a train-like platform with huge wheels that dangled precariously over the lava lake.

"Uh, that's cool," Ashley said slowly, "I think I'll stay here."

Leon shrugged, "Suit yourself." He backed up a few paces, then ran at the edge and hurled himself toward the wheel thing. He overshot it by a few feet and managed to catch an edge as he plummeted toward his death on the other side. Dangling by his fingers, he shouted back at Ashley, "WOOOOO! YEAH, BABY! DON'T DO ANYTHING STUPID UNTIL I GET BACK, NIKKI! WOOOO!" Ashley rolled her eyes as she sat down on a nearby urn and pulled out her cell phone to make a few quick calls.

Continuing on the obligatory lava theme, the next room was somehow located inside a volcano, even though the plate tectonic setting for Spain is not one that supports a volcano. But apparently, being a castellan means that Salazar can buy whatever the hell he wants from whoever he wants, including buying natural lava from Mother Nature.

Suspended above this lava lake were a trio of lovely little contraptions in the shape of dragon heads. "ROAR!" said the dragon heads, "We're not letting you get through?"

"Oh, doubt," Leon growled, "I sense your fear. In that case, take that!!!" In a whirl of bullets and craziness, Leon unleashed his fury on the flame-spitting dragons whose only mistake in life was being the victim of a typo.

Author: Oops. Sorry 'bout that, dragons.

Dragons: No problem. We really had no point anyway. It was inevitable.

At the end of the path, Leon found the final piece to the goat-snake-lion mural way back whenever. Remember that thing? Yeah, neither do we. Since Leon's pockets were full, he stuck the mural piece down the front of his shirt. Unfortunately, this did not work because Leon was not female. "Hmm, wonder why that didn't work," Leon mused as the piece fell to the floor. "Whatever!" Leon chucked the piece over the railing and into the lava below, "Probably wasn't important anyway!"

Leon rode the wheel thing back to Ashley's waiting point. As he neared the ledge, he peered into the darkness in horror. There on the other end of the track sat Ashley with a trio of Illuminados cult monks. They were playing hearts.

Ashley glared at one of the Illuminados dudes, "Hey, you can't lead with hearts until…oh, shit."

"Ashley!" Leon shouted with all the vocal presence of James Earl Jones. The Illuminados dudes all turned in fear and in seconds, they had vanished like cockroaches when someone turns on the kitchen lights. Ashley sat there in a pile of cards, her eyes wide in shock.

"What do you think you're doing?" Leon said angrily as he towered over Ashley.

Ashley cowered in fear, "Well, you took so long and I…we just wanted to…they were such nice guys…Leon, I just…"

"Whatever. Let's just go." Leon shrugged his shoulders and pointed to the next room, "We're burning daylight, babe!" He slapped Ashley on the back and she winced as the vertebrae in her back cracked loudly. She staggered to her feet and followed Leon into the next room.

Ashley wandered into the next room, still bent like an 84-year-old man and bumped right into Leon. Leon turned and looked at her giddily, "Ashley! Look! It's amazing!"

Ashley peered around Leon. In front of them sat a gilded little tram car. Leon hopped up and down excitedly, "It's the monorail! We're in Disney World! Can you believe it?!"

"We're not in Disney World," Ashley said mockingly, "We're still in Homicidal Spain, you idiot."

"I don't believe you," Leon pouted.

"What the hell are you talking about? There's a guy in a black robe sneaking up behind you wielding a mace and you think we're in Disney World? What kind of twisted Disney World did you grow up with?"

Leon raised one eyebrow and whipped in a circle, pulling his gun out all cowboy-like and blasted the cult guy with his handgun. The cult guy screamed and disappeared and Leon blew the smoke from his gun with true secret agent finesse. "What'cha think of that, hot stuff?" he said to Ashley, "Bet you're turned on now."

"Except that I totally told you about him first," Ashley muttered, "I should have kept my mouth shut and let him kick your ass."

"What was that?!"

"Nothing. Let's just go. My cell phone batteries are dying."

The pair got on the tram and rode through some magic tunnels that returned them back to where they were in the semi-beginning of Chapter 8 ("Wait, You're Speaking English?!"), back to where they first met Salazar. Underneath Salazar's speaking podium of doom stood a large mural of a knight fighting a gaping hole.

Leon stood in awe in front of the mural. "Look at this thing, Ashley," he said breathlessly as a tear of joy ran down his face, "Isn't it…beautiful?"

"There's a big chunk missing from it," Ashley said, "Also it looks like it was carved by a blind monkey on LSD."

"But a _talented_ blind monkey!" Leon reached into his pocket and pulled out the pieces of the mural that he had managed to hang on to. "What do you think these are for?"

"Judging by the fact that they're made of the same stone as that mural with the lion-goat-snake-shaped hole that's sitting Right. In. Front. Of. You." Ashley glared, "I would guess that they belong in that mural."

Leon considered this for a long time. "But if it's the same stone, then why wouldn't it be bigger?" he said seriously to Ashley.

"…What?" Ashley sputtered. She grabbed the two pieces from Leon's hands and slapped them into the wall. Something clicked behind the stone and Ashley nodded happily, "That's it! Gimmie the third piece, Leon!"

"What third piece?"

"The last piece to the mural! You have it, right?"

Leon Flashback In the dragon lava room: "Oh! Here's a piece of stone that looks like something important! Meh, not important!" Toss over the edge of the lava lake. End Leon Flashback

"Uhhh," Leon said, "I don't know what happened to it. I must have forgotten to find it." He looked around guiltily to make sure none of the dragon machines was hanging around to prove him wrong.

Ashley narrowed her eyes. "I don't believe you," she said frostily, "But knowing you, you probably ate it or dropped it in a vat of acid."

"Or threw it into a lava lake. …Not that I _did_ that, I mean! No way! Haha! Nope, I definitely didn't throw any pieces of goat art into the lava pit in that other room. Ahem."

"You are the worst liar in the history of the world. You know that, right?"

"Naw! I'm sure there's at least one person who's worse than me!"

"So now what do we do? We can't get past this gate."

"I got an idea!" Leon pulled the bubble gum he had been secretly chewing for the past seven chapters out of his mouth and stuck it against a rather large button located in the middle of the last section of hole. There was another click and the mural wall lifted. "Ha! I'm not so useless after all!" he crowed. As Leon paraded cockily under the wall, he forgot to duck, smacked his forehead against the bottom of the raised wall, and dropped to the floor in an unconscious stupid pile.

"…narcoleptic or something, you probably should get some medical help. Then again, you're also really stupid, so they might not be able to help you much anyway."

"Mommy?" Leon slurred sleepily, "I don' really wan'ta go ter school, Mommy…"

"Mommy?" Ashley's face materialized in Leon's blurry vision, "I'm not your mother. If I were, I might have to change my name and move to Acapulco. Ugh, don't even suggest that we're related." She poked Leon with her nail file, "Can we go now?"

"Yeah, but only if you schtop poking me wish shat shing," Leon said as he pulled himself to his feet, "Aw, man, I shink I bit my tongue!" After an exhausting mental workout, Leon finally figured out how to get under the wall without biting his tongue again and he and Ashley moved on into another tram room.

"How many trams does one 8th generation castellan need?" Ashley tapped the tram car with her foot, "Seriously, even we only have one at our place in Beverly Hills."

"I love trams!" Leon hopped up and down, "Let's go, Ashley!"

Rather than go into the boring details of the second tram ride, let's just assume that things passed without event. In reality, Leon and Ashley had a wicked make-out session and sparks flew like crazy down that tram tunnel. But you don't want to hear about that, do you?

You do?

Um.

Well…

Oh, they're done already. Sorry! Moving on!

Continuing on the theme of Rooms Filled with Pointless Things that Would Never Exist in a Real Castle (unless it was a castle on MTV Cribs), Leon and Ashley found themselves in a room with four giant squares on the floor and two suit of armor statues sitting randomly around the room.

"Now what do we do?" Ashley whined despondently, ready to give up and cry until someone came to save her and give her a Diet Pepsi.

"Duh, stupid," Leon retorted, "We stand on the big yellow buttons. Didn't they teach you anything at that hoity-toity college that you go to?"

"Yeah, that was in Help, I'm Kidnapped 101. Took that last semester. Douche." Ashley frowned, then thought about Leon's statement, "Actually, I'm impressed that you remembered that I go to college. Points for you."

"I don't want your stinkin' points!" Leon shouted, "Now get your fat ass over on that yellow button and stand there!"

"Fat ass! Look who's talking!"

Leon twisted to get a look at his own butt, worry evident in his voice, "It's not fat, is it? I mean, I work out pretty much every day; why should it…" He glared at Ashley, "Stop distracting me! I'm serious! Get over on that button."

"How do you know that'll even work?"

"Well, you gotta weigh, what? One-fifty?"

"Shut up!"

"No, come on. Let's see your driver's licence."

"I don't have it! Leave me alone!"

"Oh, right. You 'don't have it.' Like I believe that. You've got your cell phone with you, but not your purse?"

"Why are you always judging me!? Everyone's always judging me! Just leave me alone!" Ashley wailed and put her hands to her ears. She turned and bolted in the opposite direction, but, failing to notice the wall until it was too late, she ran smack into the ornate, vaguely Renaissance architecture and passed out cold.

Leon edged over to Ashley's motionless body and tapped her with his foot. "Hey, Girl," he said, not even bothering to try anymore, "Are you okay?"

No response.

"Well, uh, can I borrow your fat ass then?"

Still no response.

"So that's a yes, right?"

Nada.

"Okay, cool!" Leon grabbed Ashley's ankle and dragged her over to the nearest yellow square which, as it turns out, was an extremely large and impractical button. Leon then exercised his awesome manliness to drag the two suit of armor statues onto two more buttons and he, himself, sat his own fat ass on the final yellow button. There was a click and the magic hidden door of Doom opened up.

"Convenient!" Leon exclaimed as he dragged Ashley toward the new room. The bumping on the tile floor managed to wake Ashley from her little nap. She blinked a few times, then shrieked.

"Ugh! You pervert!" Ashley yanked herself free from Leon and executed a perfect roundhouse kick to Leon's shins, knocking him to the floor.

"What'd you do that for?!" Leon shouted as he stood up and dusted himself off.

"You were looking up my skirt!" Ashley shouted back. She was so angry, she didn't see Leon's boot flow through a beautiful high kick to connect with her cheekbone.

"I was not!" Leon shouted, "And anyway, it's not like you're that hot to begin with!"

"WHAT?!" Ashley's eyes flashed glowing red, "I'll have you know that the entire…," left hook to Leon's face, "football," right uppercut, "team," straight punch to Leon's gut, "wants to go out with me! Not that you'd understand what it MEANS to have every boy in the tri-county area drooling over you!"

"Oh, you'd be surprised!" Leon retorted as he grabbed Ashley's arm, twisted her around and threw her to the floor. "And tri-county area? That's the small-time, sugar! Try the tri-state area!"

"Please, children!" a familiar annoying voice, not Ashley's this time, interrupted the professional-calibur fist-fight and a short white-haired dude stepped out of the shadows, "Let's all play nice, shall we?"

"Shorty! Long time, no see!" Leon waved jauntily to Salazar, who just glared darkly.

"Hey, shut up and leave us alone!" Ashley growled, taking the moment to kick Leon while he was distracted.

"You know, maybe I underestimated you both," Salazar pondered, "After all, you've managed to kill about 400,000 of my best cult members and you still have the energy to kick each other around my expensively decorated rooms. I must say, I'm very impressed."

"Impressed enough to give us a helicopter and a twelve-hour head start back to America?"

"Mmmm…No. Enough to press this little button here…" Salazar reached over and pressed a little red button with a sign over it that read: 'Press Button for Gruesome Death'.

Nothing happened.

"So, that was it?" Ashley said after a moment.

"Wow, I'm really scared," Leon added, "Just shaaakin' in my boots here."

"Th…that's not what's supposed to happen!" Salazar stammered. He blushed furiously, "Uh, just give me a second." As Leon and Ashley waited impatiently, Salazar poked, prodded and hit the little red button until finally, some gears squeaked to life behind the walls and the ceiling, which had magical retractable spikes, began to drop.

"There!" Salazar said triumphantly, "Weasel your way out of that, you pushy American!"

"But aren't you stuck in here, too?" Ashley pointed out.

"No! That's the best part about being short!" Salazar replied and he escaped through a secret door made especially for those of vertically challenged dimensions.

"CURSE YOU, SHORTYYYYYY!!!" Leon shouted after the little George Washington wannabe.

"Hey, not to be a pest or anything," Ashley said, "But do you think…"

"Since when are you ever not a pest?"

"Haha, great. Remind me to care when we're not in danger of being smashed by a spiked ceiling. Think you can take care of that?"

"What ceiling?"

"Are you blind?! The one above our heads!"

Leon looked up, "Holy fishpaste! There _is_ a giant spiky ceiling up there! Hey, it looks like it's getting closer or something…"

"It is!!! Fix it!"

"Whoa, hey there. I'm a pizza delivery guy, not a ceiling fixer-upper-er…-er."

"I don't care! Just shoot the red blinking lights!"

"What?"

Ashley snatched Leon's handgun away and expertly shot the four blinking red lights out in the nick of time. "Idiot," she muttered under her breath and slipped out through a recently opened door into the next stupid puzzle room, "Do I have to do everything for you?"

"Well, if you're volunteering…"

"No."

"All that for some stupid red cup? You know, when I get my own castle, the one thing that I'm definitely not going to have is a truck with a big drill stuck to the front of it," Leon said, "And even if I had one, I wouldn't make people run away from it every time they needed a cup. I mean, isn't that just a waste of money? It's like the indoor tennis courts that some famous people have in their houses, doncha think? And it definitely wouldn't make you very popular with your houseguests."

"Of all the things we've run into so far," Ashley said, "You pick that stupid drill thing to be all worried about? What about the big lava pit? Or the superfluous lake room? Or the catapults at the front door?"

"Everybody needs catapults. How else would you get rid of solicitors?"

"Has anyone ever told you that you are clinically insane?"

"Haha, my mom said that to me the other day, actually. She thought it was funny that I thought my eggs were bugged, but I'm pretty sure someone was spying on me."

"You live with your mother?"

"Yes…no. No, I do not."

"So you just go eat breakfast with her every morning?"

"Hey, look! Another room to go shoot things in! Let's go!"

Through some unimportant rooms that the author can't recall right now and down a hallway with a bunch of ominous suits of armor hovering in the spooky alcoves was the room that Leon was referring to.

"Wait!" Ashley jumped in front of Leon to prevent him from entering the room, "Don't go in there yet!"

"Why the hell not?"

"Because if you did, you'd regret it."

"Oh, right," Leon scoffed, "And what makes you so all-knowing, huh, Prep-School Barbie?"

"Well, for one thing, I know for a fact that those suits of armor are going to come to life."

Leon eyed Ashley as if she had just escaped from a lunatic asylum. "They're going to…come alive, eh?"

"You don't believe me?"

"Let's play some role-reversal, here. I'll be you and you be me."

"Wait, I have to drop my IQ a couple dozen points."

"Okay, I'll wait."

"Never mind. Remind me not to waste my good jokes on you ever again."

"Okay," Leon continued, "I'm you. 'Oh, the suits of armor are going to come alive and steal my purse! You better watch out, Leon, you stud!'"

"That's not what I sound like!" Ashley pouted indignantly.

"Wanna bet?"

"I'll bet you ten dollars that the suits of armor come to life."

Leon considered this. "Okay," he said, "You're on."

"Great," Ashley said, "But before you go in there, you're going to need this." She reached down the front of her shirt and pulled out a full-size rocket launcher. "Here," she handed it to Leon, "Use it wisely, stupid."

"Where did you get that?!" Leon asked, dumbfounded, "I've been trying to buy one of those forever! How did YOU of all people get one?"

Ashley shrugged, "I found it on the ground?"

"How'd you fit this down your shirt?"

Ashley glared, "Are you saying my boobs are small?"

"What? No, I…"

"Are you saying I'm fat?!"

"NO! Geez, lighten up, Fatty…"

Muttering about Ashley and her weight issues, Leon shouldered the rocket launcher and walked into the room. Immediately, the fairly obviously placed gate dropped down behind him, blocking his only path of retreat.

Things picked up the pace from then on. As Leon gaped incredulously at the gate that he had _totally_ not seen five seconds before, he heard a loud clanking noise behind him. He turned to see three suits of armor moving toward him, their rather rusty, old battle axes held high.

"Holy medieval period artwork!" Leon shouted, "What's going on here?"

"I told you," was all Ashley said.

"Yeah, well, it's not my fault you're untrust…hey! My IQ is not a couple dozen points lower than yours! Bitch!"

"You just _now_ got that?"

"Are you saying I'm stupid?"

"Leon, pay attention or you're going to die!" Ashley shrieked. This snapped Leon back to the most pressing problem on hand: the three suits of armor that were still lumbering awkwardly toward him.

Fumbling, Leon frantically tried to figure out what to do. Suddenly, it hit him. It was so simple! He picked up the rocket launcher, took aim, and…

FssshhhBAMMMMMM!

"Dude!" Leon laughed hysterically at the blackened spot of ash on the floor, "That was freakin' sweet!" He repeated the process with the remaining two knights, and then the three that followed, all the while, laughing uncontrollably. Finally, when no knights remained for Leon to vaporize, the little pedestal in the center of the room opened up to reveal the King's Chalice. Leon pocketed the 'stupid cup' and went to leave the room.

As he crossed the threshold to the knight room, the rocket launcher magically vanished. "Hey!" Leon shouted angrily to the room, "Give me that back!"

"Sorry, no can do," said the author, "I just thought it was funny to shoot the knights with the rocket launcher and so I had to put it in there. You don't get to keep it."

"Why not?" Leon whined, "Ashley, do you have another one of those down your shirt?"

"No."

"Can you at least _check_?"

Ashley checked, "No."

"Geez, what good are you if you don't even have any high-powered weapons hidden in your cleavage?" Leon muttered darkly, "And you, you stupid author, "I don't like that you're toying with my emotions."

"Did you call me stupid?"

"Uh, no! No!"

"No, I think you did."

"No, I didn't!"

"You did. I'm typing up your dialogue for you. I can see where you called me stupid."

"Um, well, maybe you're reading it wrong, because I totally did not…"

"Are you calling me illiterate?"

"What?! No! No way!"

Ashley sighed, "Can we just get on with this?"

"Are you rushing me?" the author barked at Ashley.

"No! Don't hurt me!"

"Then get moving, you puny figments of Capcom's imaginations!" the author shouted, "Moo ha ha! It's good to have the power."

Moving on. Ashley and Leon used the cups that they had found, blah, blah, blah. The cups opened up a door leading to a huge domed room covered with brown nastiness resembling a combination of earwax and tobacco juice on every possible surface.

Ashley recoiled violently and began freaking out immediately upon entering the room. "OMG!" she wailed, clinging to Leon's arm, "Save me, Leon! LEEEEEOOON!"

"Dude!" Leon tossed her off him, "What is with you? I thought we decided that you aren't allowed to shriek in my face like that anymore!"

"When did we agree that?"

Leon shrugged, "Doesn't matter. Come on, let's go."

Ashley shook her head, "I don't want to, Leon."

"You baby! What, are you afraid of the goop on the floor? Do you want me to carry you, Princess?"

"No! Well, yeah, that stuff is nasty and it's going to ruin my uggs, but that's not why I don't want to go."

Leon sighed overdramatically, "For crying out LOUD, what's the problem, now?"

"I have a bad feeling about this place."

"That's all? Listen, sugar, I've had a bad feeling about this entire place since I stepped out of that stupid police cruiser. But you don't see _me_ whining about it, do you? Do you? No. Now, it's 11:34 p.m. right now. If we get out of here in seven hours and catch the first flight back, I won't miss Grey's Anatomy. Are _you_ going to make _me_ miss Grey's Anatomy?"

"You watch Grey's Anatomy?"

"ARE YOU?!?!"

"No, Leon, you don't get it. I've got this feeling that if I step past that part of the floor," Ashley pointed to the floor, "A hoarde of bug things will sweep out of the sky and carry me away."

"And then what?"

"Then what? I dunno, they'll probably kill me or something."

"Hmm…"

"LEON!"

"Whatever. I don't care about your stupid feminine _feelings_, okay? I am a man and whatever I say, goes. Got it?"

"But…"

Changing tactics, Leon held up a rhinestone-studded piece of plastic, "I've got your cell phone…"

Ashley's eyes widened. She dashed forward and snatched the cell phone from Leon's fingers faster than the human eye can see. Then a hoarde of bug things swarmed down from the giant earwax nest to pick Ashley up and fly out of a window and into the dark Spanish night.

"I TOLD YOUUUUUUU!" Ashley wailed as the bugs carried her away.

"Well, damn," Leon said, "She was right." But he didn't have time to muse over Ashley's apparently psychic powers because at that moment, all the bugs that didn't carry Ashley off Flying-Monkey Style attacked Leon with their Acid Vomit of Death.

Leon put up a valiant fight, but after half an hour of kicking and punching at the far-too-touchy bugs, he stomped his foot and yelled, "Wait a minute!"

The bugs froze and stared at Leon in amazement. Who knew such a squishy, soft-shelled creature could make such a loud noise?

"What is with you creepy bug things?" Leon continued, "Seriously, you puke all over me and now my clothes have acid holes in them, which is actually kind of sexy, but still! I paid top-dollar for these things at Target! Now what's your excuse? Are you guys drunk or something!?"

The Novistadors (the bugs) exchanged ashamed glances and suddenly they all found the ground and walls extremely interesting.

"What, you mean you are?"

One of the bugs nodded and pantomimed something for Leon.

"You guys are in Alcoholics Anonymous?"

The bugs all nodded and the lead bug continued explaining to Leon through Novistador Sign Language. One of the bugs began to cry and the other bugs comforted him.

"You just can't control your drinking?" Leon translated for himself, "Well, hey. I can solve that. You can just give me all your booze. That way, you won't have anything to drink."

The bugs looked at each other. They hadn't thought of this. One of the bugs waved his hand and gestured to his wallet.

"Yeah, just give me all your money so you can't buy any more, too," Leon said, solving the bug's question.

The bugs all got really excited. This might actually work this time! One of the bugs snapped his fingers and the big earwax nest on the ceiling disappeared and several gallons of booze fell to the floor of the room. Leon drooled in excitement.

After turning over all their pesetas and their credit cards to Leon, the Novistadors waved jauntily goodbye to their new American buddy and flew out through another window to find their friends who stole that annoying blonde chick. Leon watched them go, then turned to the large pile of alcohol.

"This is my lucky day!" he exclaimed, "I knew if I kept hanging out with that stupid blonde girl, I'd find beer eventually! Time to drink my troubles away!"

_A/N: Sorry this took so long to update. I go in these cycles of inspiration and…not-inspiration and Chapter 12 happened to land squarely on an "I'm actually not funny at all" slump. This chapter isn't one of my favorites, either (except the part with the rocket launcher) and for that, I apologize, too. I promise I'll get hyped up on sugar for the next one and it'll be great. Again, thanks for hanging with me this long, thanks for your great comments, and please note: _I do not own any previously-owned characters in this fanfic. _Thank you. _


	14. Ch 13: Making It Easy Was Never So Hard

**Chapter 13: 'Making It Easy' Was Never So Hard…**

When we last left our hero, he was providing practical and responsible life advice to a flock of giant vomiting bugs. As the Novistadors (bugs) flew out of the earwax dome we were last standing in, Leon smiled happily, "Y'know, Ashley? I think I did a good thing here today."

Leon pondered for a moment, "You know, perhaps there's something to this 'good' thing. I've spent my whole life living for myself and trying to ignore the plights of those around me. But this has made me think. I could give up my selfish lifestyle and become a do-gooder! What do you think, Ashley?"

There was no response to Leon's life-changing revelation.

"Ashley? Where'd you go, sweetheart?" Leon looked all around, but there was no sign of the girl.

Psh crackle crackle "Meester Scott Kennedy?"

"Damn it all to hell…," Leon picked up his walkie talkie, "What the hell do you want, you creepy stalker? I'm trying to revel in the fact that I've really made a difference in some peoples'…bugs' lives."

"So it was _your _fault my Novistadors all just turned in their resignations!"

"Yeah, that was me."

"Bastard! How am I supposed to find replacement bug slaves on such short notice! No temp agency can possibly work that fast!"

"Maybe you'll think of that next time you decide to mistreat your employees. I hope they unionize on you!"

Salazar hissed, "How dare you!! The worst insult I could ever receive! I should come down there and kill you right now!"

"Oh, yeah? Why don't you?"

"I'm busy entertaining _your_ annoying girlfriend. When are you going to come get her? We're tired of her constant whining and we'd consider it a great favor if you…"

"Since when do I have a girlfriend…I mean, yeah! What are you doing to her, you sick bastard! …You're talking about that Ashley chick, right?"

Ashley's happy voice squealed in the background, "He got my name right! Did you guys hear…oomph!"

"Shut up, girl!" Salazar yelled at Ashley. To Leon, he said, "Yes, that's her. Wait, are you sure you guys aren't dating yet? Haven't we already passed the part in the horror movie where the male and female lead make passionate love, since they believe they are about to die?"

"Two things wrong with that plan," Leon said, "Not once in the past eight hours have I thought I was going to die."

"What's the second thing?"

"Ummmmm…I can't remember."

"So you're sure you're not dating? Because the little snot is going on and on about what kind of cake you're going to have at your wedding and what you're going to name your first child."

"Are you sure that's the same girl? Because the chick that's been hanging around me hasn't done much more than scream and whine. And glare at me like a teenager."

"Well, she's doing that, too, in addition to the 'designing her love nest in the suburbs' thing. It's actually kind of uncomfortable to listen to." Salazar paused, "Oh, well! It's not like it's going to matter in a few hours anyway!"

"What do you mean?" Leon asked suspiciously.

Salazar sighed, as if Leon had asked him to solve a hugely complicated math problem as a personal favor, "If you _must know_, in a few hours, we're going to complete some sort of foggy blood ritual and make Whiny McBitcherson into one of us."

"What kind of ritual?" Leon challenged, his dander rising, "You sick short freak, you better not hurt her! Or hurt her, but don't do it somewhere visible, so I don't get in trouble when I bring her home."

Salazar giggled, "What a touching moment! Should I start shopping for baby clothes now or should we wait until you two can pick out matching wedding rings?"

"Shut up, you! You know what? Here's what we'll do. You leave What's-Her-Face there and then do us all and leave before the audience gets pissed off?"

"Oh…oh, yeah?" Salazar sputtered furiously, "You're nothing…nothing but an extra in my script, so don't get too carried away!! Your biggest scene is over!!"

"I don't remember being a part of your crappy script!"

"Well then, why don't you show me what a first-class script is like."

"You mean like this paperback copy of _Othello_ that I carry around in my front pocket?"

"Through your own actions, Meester Kennedy Scott Leon!"

"Dude, are you ever going to get my name right? Didn't I tell you to just call me Leon?"

"Oh, but do you really think we've reached that level of informality? Because…"

"Hey, can you hurry? Because I'm tired of standing here listening to you."

"You know what? Just walk outside, go through the clock tower, and then allow me to kill you and we'll be all squared away. _Capice_?"

"…I don't know what that means."

"Just get your ass over here so I can kill you! Or your little girlfriend will be a pile of parasite-infested organs!"

"But how do I get out?"

"You're a moron! Do you see the drawbridge?"

"Uhhhhh…"

"Turn to your right."

"Nothing."

"Your _other_ right."

"Uhhhhhh…"

"God, you're a brain-damaged idiot! Hold on." Salazar disappeared for a moment and then the glaringly obvious drawbridge crashed away from the chains that held it up and fell open. Salazar reappeared, "There. Can you see that now?"

"Oh, hey! Did you know there's a drawbridge here?! …Salazar?" Leon looked at his walkie-talkie, "He hung up on me. Huh." Leon pocketed his walkie-talkie and left the Earwax Coliseum behind.

Leon moved briskly through the next puzzle-challenge. Mostly, that's because Salazar, so thoroughly frustrated with Leon's inability to get his ass in gear, solved the puzzle for him. The other reason was that Leon was trying out his new 'nice-guy' shtick.

"Hey, cult guys!" Leon greeted the black-robed zombie-men with a sugary grin and a jaunty wave, "Hope you're having a wonderful, sunshine-filled day!"

The cult members were confused. The skinny over the Castle Radio was that the American secret agent was Death incarnate, not this happy-go-lucky guy who might as well have been skipping rope down the blood-stained path to the Castillian HQ. The cult members looked at each other, thoroughly baffled as to what to do.

"So…do we kill him?" Cult Member 345,115,991 said.

"I say we do. He killed my eight hundred brothers, after all," said another cult member (numbers really are superfluous at this point, aren't they?).

"Eight hundred? Are you sure?" CM Another One said, "Because I'm pretty sure I saw Jose at the castle cafeteria during dinner."

"Okay, so eight hundred is a rough estimate," the miffed cult member retorted, "But still. How am I going to tell Mom that all her sons were killed by some psycho American?"

"But he's not psycho…"

"…Or _is_ he?"

The cult members all gazed in awe at Leon as he frolicked past, tossing flowers into the air like confetti and singing "The 59th Street Bridge Song". It was so _simple_, they thought to themselves! He's _pretending_ to be a peace-loving hippie to lure those around him into a false sense of security!

Or.

He's _pretending_ to be evil so anyone he ran into didn't think he was a sissy-pansy-face and discover his secret, tender side!

"It's so simple!" The cult members all said at once, "And so brilliant! He's a genius! Let's worship him instead of the bug-infested spider man we're worshipping now!"

But just as the cult members were about to worship Leon's everlasting presence, Leon frolicked by and tossed a bouquet of flowers on them. Normally, this wouldn't be a problem, except that Cult Member One of the Crowd was deathly allergic to the flowers Leon was throwing.

Cult Member One of the Crowd erupted into a fit of violent sneezing. In his attempt to get his allergies under control, he grabbed onto the nearest of his brainwashed coworkers. But none of the coworkers could stop the allergic cult member from sneezing so hard that he fell over the wall and into the Conveniently Placed Pit of Despair below the castle. As he fell, the cult member dragged all his buddies over the wall, one by one until all that was left was screaming and the faint sound of extreme sneezing.

Leon timidly looked over the edge, "Gosh, I hope I didn't have anything to do with that! Good people don't kill people, do they?" He thought about this, gave up, and shrugged as he moved on down the amazingly easy path to the Cult Headquarters of Death and Pain.

"Golly gosh, it sure is a long walk to wherever I'm going," Leon remarked, pushing open the door to the HQ of D&P, as it's called down in da hood, "I hope I get there soon, or I daresay, I may run out of Fruit Roll-ups! And…something bad may happen. I…OMFG, MAN!"

Now, Leon is not a hard guy to please, as is evidenced by the entire beginning of this story. You can jingle your car keys in front of the guy and he'll bat playfully at them like a fluffy widdle calico kitten, yes he will! He's a good kitty, inn't he? He might even purr, if you're lucky. But for as much as Leon is unbelievably easily distracted, it takes a lot to get his attention enough to scream Omfg all in caps.

The thing that caught Leon's attention was not the four cult members bearing down on him with maces and the like. It also was not the two very angry and very hung-over Blind Slashers that stood on the landing in front of him, shaking their heads at the wild castle party they had crashed the night before (Blind Slashers generally aren't invited to castle parties. They tend to chug all the beer and feel up the ladies, which usually doesn't go over well).

Anyway, the thing that caught Leon's attention was not even breathing, really. Leon's eyes widened is pure, unadulterated joy. He sprinted forward as fast as his little legs could carry him and hurled himself onto not one, not two, but three! Yes three! bells that sat on the landing behind the hungover Slashers.

"BELLS!" Leon crowed, still taking advantage of the moment to use his capslock button extensively, "I LOVE BELLS! MY MOM HAD A BELL WHEN I WAS A KID!! RING, BELL, RING!!! SING YOUR JOYFULL SONG OUT TO THE MASSES!!!"

"ROARRRGH!" Blind Slasher #1 said (translation: What the fuck, man? Why is that guy yelling? My head is throbbing so fucking bad…)

"REEEEARRGH!" Blind Slasher #2 replied (translation: Now he's fucking ringing the fucking bells! Oh, God, I think my fucking brains are going to explode! Make him fucking stop, man!" Because apparently, the Blind Slashers are drunken frat boys. And in not the nice, help-you-change-your-tire sort of way.)

"Heeheehee," said the Illuminados cult members giggled. The Blind Slashers turned and glared at the cult members (well, 'glared' is a figure of speech in this case…) and the cult guys bowed their heads in ashamed silence. It's not nice to make fun of the handicapped.

"RARERAARARGH!" said Blind Slasher #1, pointing in the general direction of Leon (translation: Dude! Cut it the hell out! Unless you have some fucking Aspirin, because I could use a fucking ton of that shit right now, man! Know what I mean?) . But of course, in addition to not speaking any language ever, including body language, Leon was also incapable of recognizing the classic signs of a hangover in a genetically mutated being.

In fact, Leon was still completely oblivious to the fact that two blind men with adamantine skeletons built into their magical bodies were bearing down on him, angry to the point of painful dismemberment and embarrassing hazing. "Lalala," Leon sung happily at the bell, "I love you…Love you, love you, love you, bell…"

Suddenly, some synapse in Leon's brain twinged. Or it might have been one Utterly Impatient Ramon Salazar sitting in the very next room watching the whole scene on closed-circuit television forcing Leon's bloodthirsty head-rippy-offy parasite to nibble a little faster on Leon's brainstem. Whatever it was, Leon snapped to attention.

"There was something I was supposed to be doing!" Leon muttered in surprise to himself, surprise because he'd never been able to remember anything in the presence of a bell before. Automatically, Leon rose to his feet and began walking mechanically toward the door in the back of the room. Yes, the one with the bars over the front of it. What? I didn't mention bars? Or even a door? Well, there was one. It was there the whole time. It's not my fault you didn't notice.

So. The Blind Slashers looked at each other (ha!) in confusion. Why in Saddler's name wasn't this guy afraid of them? Normally, people wet their pants and pleaded for mercy when faced with the awesome power of the Blind Slashers' trademark Claws of Dismemberment (also useful for opening beer bottles in lieu of a bottle opener). But this…there were no words strong enough in the Blind Slashers' quite limited vocabulary for what this guy was.

"RARARARARRARARRAAAAAR!!!!" Blind Slasher #1 suggested (translation: Let's take this guy and shove his head in a fucking toilet, man!)

"WAAARRRARRRRAAAER!!!" Blind Slasher #2 replied (translation: No man! Let's make him streak through the fucking castle, draw on him with permanent marker and then steal his clothes and feed them to the giant fucking fish way back in Chapter 4!!)

This was something the Blind Slashers could agree on: humiliation in the form of nudity. They stalked closer to Leon, being as subtle about it as they could, bumping into a world record of one less than every single column on the way.

But Robot Leon had senses of…Senses of the Future. He was like the Bionic Man, only less Bionic, not computery at all, and not _really_ very manly. He turned sharply, his cruel and malicious eyes flashing angrily at the not-so-hidden Blind Slashers as they crept forward with their black Sharpie ™ permanent markers in hand. A whirring noise came from the back of Leon's neck and all of a sudden, bright red lasers shot from Leon's eyes and burned off the first Blind Slasher's head exactly like Anakin got his arms cut off in the third Star Wars. It was pretty badass.

The second Blind Slasher would have stopped and run for his life, had he seen what had happened to his _compadre_. As it is, he kept stalking. This was a fatal mistake.

Leon turned his angry laser vision, his pupils actually spurting mini-fountains of laser, on the cult members. The cult members were at a supreme advantage over the Blind Slashers, being both vision-talented and alive. They blinked, then threw all the contents of their pockets at Leon and ran as fast as they could away from the dapper blonde robot American who didn't even need his snappy bomber jacket anymore, he was just that cool.

As soon as Leon was the only living creature in the room, his laser vision subsided and he returned to his normal, bumbling, slightly attractive but incredibly stupid self. Also, the door opened. "Sweet!" Leon clapped his hands, "I should hang out with bells more often!"

"…Should have been here by now! I mean, we cleared the path for him, we put our wussiest blind Wolverines out there, we even _told him the way_! Why is this taking so long?" Salazar sat on a giant throne in the room right next door to the bell room, tapping his fingers angrily.

Ashley sat on the floor, her hands tied behind her back and an issue of Spanish Cosmopolitan open on the floor in front of her. She periodically turned the pages with her knee and rolled her eyes at Salazar's bitching before returning to the Spanish sex advice columns.

Salazar's Verdugo slaves, Whitey and Redy looked at each other uncomfortably. Times were hard. They had to do something. If Salazar fired them because they couldn't make the stupid American man get here faster, they might find themselves jobless and living in cardboard boxes on the streets of Seville. They'd been through the unemployment line once before and they knew from experience that it's hard to find jobs as janitors or secretaries if you look like a giant bug from the depths of hell, even if you can speak as eloquently as an Oxford graduate.

"If we don't get this done soon, I'm just leaving!" Salazar shouted, pointing at the closed circuit TV to his right, "_Desperate Housewives_ is on in an hour and if I'm not parked in front of the couch, heads will roll, I tell you!"

"Weren't you already trying to kill Leon?" Ashley said dryly, "Shouldn't his head roll anyway, even if he shows up late?"

"SHUT UP, YOU!!" Salazar held up a hand to smack Ashley, but instead of recoiling, she just stared at him distastefully. Salazar glared his most evilly, but then sheepishly gave up when it became obvious that Ashley wasn't afraid of his scrawny self.

"So…" Ashley said after a long pause, "Are you really only twenty years old?"

"Ashley." Leon burst through the door, looking all windblown and Clark Gable-y. He struck a heroic pose and the lights dimmed suddenly, throwing him into spotlight. Leon nodded smugly, "Yeah… That's what I was lookin' for!"

"Leon." Ashley replied neutrally, "What's up, dude?"

"FINALLY!!" Salazar shrieked, jumping in his chair, "Now I can kill you and get to _Housewives_ before the first commercial break! You die now!" He gestured to the Praying Mantis in white robes, who just shrugged at his companion. "Press the button, you twit!"

Whitey looked at his partner and they both shook their heads in confusion.

"The button right next to you! The one that opens the Trap Door of Death right underneath where he's standing! Do it now!"

"There's a trap door here?" Leon stared intently at the floor, "Really? I don't see anything!"

"God!!" Salazar huffed, "Do I have to do everything myself?"

"Wow, because I don't even see the door creases," Leon was saying, "This is a damn good trap door then, because I've never seen one this secret-y! Where did you buy it? Sears? Because that's where I got my traaaaaaaaaaa...!!"

"No!" Ashley shouted, tossing her Cosmo to one side, where one of the Praying Mantises picked it up and stuffed it surreptitiously into his robes, "Leon!"

All four of the humans and humanoid things waited in heavy silence, Salazar cupping his ear comically in a manner reminiscent of Looney Tunes cartoons. After a good five minutes of silence, Salazar frowned, "Where's the satisfying sound of one's impalement?"

"Hey, hey guys!" Leon's voice drifted up from the gaping hole in the center of the room, "Can…Can I get a little help here? My Batgear Utility Belt is kind of acting up… and now I'm grapple-hooked to the wall or something…Could you toss a rope down or maybe one of those water-rescue stretchers? I've always wanted to ride in one of those…"

"GOD #$#& DAMMIT!" Salazar screamed so loudly that even Ashley snapped out of her teenage apathy to stare warily at him. "THIS IS SO NOT COOL!!" He whirled and glared in red-eyed fury at the nearest victim, who turned out to be Redy the Verdugo. "No more games! Kill him now!" Salazar spat (literally).

Brushing the flecks of spit off his robes, Redy looked sadly at Whitey. They both knew in his heart that he wouldn't come back from this task he had been handed. Tears welled in Whitey's eyes (if he had eyes) and he gloomily patted Redy on the back, the only affection that had been socially acceptable to express in their days as little Verdugo.

But Redy could stand it no more. He threw his arms around his best friend's neck and hugged him close, saying a wordless farewell to his one true friend in the world. Then Redy stood up straight and, with a deep sigh, set off into the sewers below to meet his doom. Whitey watched, his shoulders trembling. On the floor, silent tears of sorrow rolled down Ashley's face and, even where he dangled precariously over a patch of Ill-Placed Spikes, Leon was sobbing like a little girl, using precious green herbs as hankies.

When Redy finally left the room, Salazar picked up his TV guide and flipped hastily through it, "Now…what channel is ABC on…" He waved his hand at Whitey, who had collapsed into a pile of tears, "When my show is done, we'll complete the ritual! Don't forget it!"

"Leon," Ashley whispered as she tried to comfort the creepy Praying Mantis as best she could, considering she was afraid to come within two feet of him, "I hope you don't do something stupid and die…"

After dangling hopelessly on the wall of the trap door for a good fifteen minutes, Leon finally managed to untangle himself from his grapple-hook cord and he rappelled down to the bottom of the pit while miraculously avoiding being stabbed by the ridiculously large spikes.

"Hey!" he shouted happily, "It's dirty again! It feels just like home!"

"SHUT UP DOWN THERE!" Salazar screamed down the hole, "Or at least wait until a commercial!"

Leon rolled his eyes and wandered around the spike pit, picking up the random treasures, including one shiny crown that Leon immediately plopped on his head, and other junk that lay in the infected sewer water at the base of the pit. In one corner, he ran into the Merchant, who once again refused to sell him anything more valuable than a banana peel. After a few more minutes, Leon's walkie-talkie crackled.

"What the hell is with you?" Salazar shouted over the walkie-talkie, "Are you a freakin' CAT or something? With your nine lives and shit? Because I don't appreciate this at all, man!"

"Wait..what?"

"I'm not done yet!" Salazar interrupted, "You come into my castle, you shoot my minions, you vandalize my windows and kill my defenseless puppies…"

"Dude, if those were defenseless puppies…"

"Still talking! And NOW you interrupt my show _and_ you don't die when I tell you to! Arghggh!" He sighed, "But it doesn't matter now, Meester Kennedy Scott Kennedy! I've sent my right hand to dispose of you!"

"Your right hand comes off?"

"Yes…no…No, you see, it's my…DAMMIT! SHOW'S BACK ON!! GO AWAY!" Click pisshle pisshle.

"He hung up on me!" Leon stared wide-eyed at his walkie-talkie. He raised his eyebrows at the crumbly skeleton next to where he stood, "Can you believe him? The nerve!"

_A/N: After a long hiatus, I'm back! I've been working on other things and I've been too not-inspired to write, but here, dear fans who still subscribe to this story, is another chapter! _

_The one radio transmission right before Leon fights the Blind Slashers is from earlier in the game. I forgot to put it in and it was just so stinkin' hilarious, I had to put it in! So here it is. I love that you can take the dialogue almost word for word, stick it into the story, and it's still ridiculous._

_Next will be the Verdugo fight and probably Krauser. Hopefully, Krauser. He'll be fun… Stay tuned! _

_NOTE: I don't own anything in here that was previously trademarked, copyrighted, or otherwise legally claimed. I just own all the words around _those_ words. _


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